


The King and I

by Clarice Chiara Sorcha (claricechiarasorcha)



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gladiator Thor, M/M, Odin's A+ Parenting, Self-Indulgent, Sibling Incest, Terrible Dads
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-18
Updated: 2017-04-25
Packaged: 2018-10-20 16:36:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 39,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10666578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/claricechiarasorcha/pseuds/Clarice%20Chiara%20Sorcha
Summary: A frisson danced light over his skin, the portent of coming storm. “I beg your pardon?”“You are my king.” He paused, and Loki could hear him swallow. “Let me learn how to pleasure you.” When he glanced up, Loki found Thor’s eyes were now the dark blue of a sky bruised by relentless thunder. “Allow me your body, and you will have my soul.”Odin Allfather and Frigga Allmother have only one son: Loki Silvertongue, Heir-Prince of golden Ásgarðr.Thor is a country lordling, come to the city to ply his strength as a hopeful to the Einherjar.It is in the gladiatorial arena that they meet.And there: itbegins.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Schaudwen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schaudwen/gifts).



> This is a repost of a fic I started what feels an age ago; it was on AO3 for a time, but I took it down for a variety of peculiar reasons. I kept at it on tumblr for a while, but never got very far. The thing is, though, that @[schauwden](http://schaudwen.tumblr.com/%22) has been loyal and unfailing in her support of this story, and it's her birthday soon, so I figured I'd honour that and post the continuation of things in a format that's slightly easier to read. She has also, over time, drawn some incredible art inspired by the story, which I'll link as we go along. She is amazing. Just so you know. <3
> 
> In the meantime: this is an overly indulgent and slightly ridiculous AU that got started because I'd been watching too much _Spartacus: Blood and Sand_ and I really just wanted Loki obsessing over Thor, soaked in blood and sweat and glory and very little else, and...well. We'll see where it goes, but let's just say Odin and Laufey aren't the kind to make the lives of those around them easy. In any way. :D

He had spoken to her that morning of the afternoon’s planned diversion; partly it had been teasing, knowing she enjoyed the annual spectacle as much as any other. But then it had also been simply because he had no-one else to trust with his delight.

“Oh Mother, he’s _delicious_.”

Frigga’s laughter had been merry, but he could see concern lurking beneath the amusement. “Enjoy yourself, my darling,” she said, eyes very bright, “but do remember the enjoyment of kings is watched by many.”

“And envy me they shall.”

For all the light pleasure of those words, he had not missed her meaning. With the Allfather deep in the Odinsleep and Loki alone the regent of Ásgarðr, there would be many seeking to find fault with his rule. As the image of his mother dissolved away Loki had felt the strangest pang of loneliness. She was far from him, and from Ásgarðr’s dreaming spires – on sabbatical with lovely Freyja in the wild countries of Vanaheimr. But then, her trust had always carried more weight than the jealousies of lesser creatures.

With the official duties of the day discharged, Loki had waited in the private courtyard below his rooms for the warrior to be brought to him. A private training session could not be regarded as strange: the country-dwelling Æsir came to Glaðsheimr once a year to fight before the court in great pageant, seeking out places amongst the mighty Einherjar – and those who did not meet such standard or suit the soldier’s life might still find their place amongst the retinue of many a high noble.

It was but natural that the king himself might have his pick of the young warriors come before him. While he had never before been sole regent, it was not Loki’s first rite of choosing; from boyhood he had actively made his own decisions, bringing in the best men of the gathered masses to serve the family royal. And in a realm where a king fought at the head of his army, well, it could only be appropriate that he might learn of his warriors’ strength in the most active way possible.

Loki brought no seiðr to the spar. Instead he nurtured a simple desire simply to see the magnificent body up close. While watching the earliest bouts, he had come to quickly know the _power_ of him. But it was not merely the physical that intrigued Loki so – this particular Ás entered the field with a smile, left with laughter on his lips, and in the moments in between became a creature of storm and lightning strike. Such a preternatural strength set him far apart, gifted him a kind of mental stamina that held him on his feet long after cowardice or exhaustion would drive others to retreat.

There on the training fields and in the yards, Loki had summoned the man before him. But first, he had long watched him amongst comrades and competitors. For all his victories came thick and fast, his easy manner and generous personality had men of lesser ability flitting about him like moths to brilliant flame. Loki had thought it simple self-preservation, those other men seeking to better themselves by associating with the most skilled of them all.

Yet they had spoken once, twice, three times – and Thor had surprised him on each and every occasion. While hardly as educated as the nobles of the city, his mind proved quick, his humour wry enough to both catch Loki’s habitual sarcasm, and to soften its darkest edges. Yet he was not so arrogant as those of his calibre so often were. He deferred to Loki’s high position with an ease that might have grated, had he not worn sincerity as easily as the leather cloak draped about those broad and inviting shoulders.

Even then few would have predicted Loki’s curiosity. In every way they seemed absolute opposites, polarised and distant. But Loki had not thought twice of inviting Thor Björnsson for a private spar this night.

While the next days would bring the final trials of strength and cunning, such invitations would rarely be denied – especially when they might promise the king’s own patronage. Thor had readily accepted. But the wide grin he wore at the time had felt far warmer than mere duty. Loki had turned away, wordless. But he had only done so knowing they would meet again soon enough.

Indeed, when Thor had entered the salle in the gardens beneath his chambers, it had been as if Loki had summoned the sun itself. From childhood, friends had been few and far between, and his family small and tight-knit. Always others had prostrated themselves before the crown prince of Ásgarðr. Yet Thor gave his friendship as easily as his smiles, and Loki could not help but want it all and only for himself.

But he had called Thor here for a fight: and he provided one. It could be no surprise that Thor fought well, given the gift of his well-hewn body – though he also often proved surprisingly quick on his feet, for one of such size. For all they began and remained weaponless, Thor proved himself a force of absolute nature: focused, immutable, deadly.

Loki would always be quicker, yet even he could not hold out forever. The match ended only when he lay with his back to the floor, breath coming in short sharp gasps. Above him Thor loomed like the rising sun, heat radiating from the great half-naked body. Eyes the colour of winter sky locked to his, lips curved in a berserker grin. Stretching one arm out, muscles trembling with acid exhaustion, Loki tapped himself out.

He did not once break gaze with the man pressing him to the ground.

“I cede the victory.”

They held that gaze for a long moment – strange, for Thor more often would extend a comradely hand, grasping forearms so he might pull his defeated opponent back to his feet and grant him his dignity. Instead they searched one another, breathing slowing to a matched rhythm. Then he drew back, turned his face away. Loki still caught the faint troubled expression he wore. Keeping his own secret smile to himself, Loki rose from the mats. Splashing his face with water from one of the many bowls scattered about the chamber, he gathered himself, revelling in the burn of muscle. He could feel Thor’s eyes upon him: thoughtful, analytical, watchful. A true warrior indeed.

“There are others,” Loki said suddenly, “given these circumstances, who might have allowed me to win.”

A strange look crossed those broad features, brow furrowed and blue eyes shuttered. “Should I have done so?”

This smirk Loki allowed him to see, low and hard. “If you had, I would never consider you an Einherjar.”

After that he permitted no more words. Loki walked away, one hand crooked behind him in a summons forward. A beat later, Thor followed him up spiralling staircases, and into the stone vaulted bath chamber. Water gurgled from golden spigots fashioned as coiled serpents, steam rising from the shifting surface of the central pool. He appeared a golden statue where he stood near the door, sheened with perspiration though he was; he remained motionless as Loki carelessly stripped away training leathers and undergarments, stepping beneath a high shower of water to wash away the worst of the grime. With a practised tilt of hip, pressing back soaked hair from narrowed eyes, Loki stepped into the tub. He liked it too hot. He always had.

“Come, aid your king.”

His brow had taken a deep crease, but Thor did not deny clear order. Instead he came behind him, hands moving to rest upon his shoulders. There, they moved: strong and supple, they held the knowing and skill of one accustomed to the strain of muscle, the over-stretched pull of tendon and ligament. Loki could not help but arch into the touch. Only when he allowed a faint purr to escape, did the hands withdraw.

In the stillness that followed, Loki forced Thor to speak first. “Is this another test?”

He trailed fingers in the heated water, watched the ripples advance and multiply. “In what manner?”

Though he had realised from near the beginning that Thor was no muscle-bound fool, the length of time that Thor contemplated his answer surprised him. “I have desired this from boyhood: coming to the golden city, joining the ranks of the mighty Einherjar,” he said at last, voice oddly flat for one who spoke of such passion. “I have trained for it every day, dreamed of it every night.”

“And now it is so very nearly yours.”

“And I would have it only for myself.” Conviction resonated from him like heat from a supernova. “If this is a price that must be paid, then I am afraid I cannot afford it.”

Now Loki turned, no smile, voice warning. “You would say no to your king?”

Keeping his head high, Thor allowed his shoulders to move in the slightest of shrugs. Somehow, even dirty with sweat and dressed only in an initiate’s loincloth, he wore humility with a noble tilt Loki could not have mastered in five thousand years. “Rather, I would beg of him his understanding.”

Loki did not bother to hold back a snort, eyes flicking downward to what so scant clothing could not hope to hide. “You want me.”

Even had he not been an honest creature, Loki did not doubt Thor when he said, “I do.” And he sighed, shaking his head, the small braids of his hair brushing his cheeks. “But desiring you and my desire for a place in your army are two distinct creatures. I would not have them meet.”

Turning about more fully, Loki scowled. “If you complete the trials, you will be Einherjar. No one will question your fitness or your suitability. Everything about you is the warrior Ásgarðr desires.” Now he allowed his features to lighten, voice taking the easy seductiveness that had won him a diplomatic reputation unmatched by any other ruler in the nine realms. “If you stay here with me now, it will be your choice, answer to my request.” Much as he wished to reach out, to touch, Loki held back, let his voice be the siren call of shared pleasure. “It will be only your desire – and mine.”

Thor remained very quiet, his eyes lowered so Loki might not observe the thoughts that moved behind them. But when he raised his head, they were clear and honest. “As you wish.”

The words sent a shiver through even him, prince of a golden realm who had since boyhood been granted his heart’s every desire. “Come.” Standing, he paused a moment to allow water to cascade from flushed skin. Thor’s lovely eyes were caught, held, blue almost entirely eclipsed by the black of pupils blown wide.

Loki waved one hand over the water. “Bathe.”

Watching him shuck the loincloth, then step beneath the spray, Loki made no motion to cover himself. As Thor finished his initial ablutions he seated himself upon the broad edge of the tub, one ankle in the water still. The tableau of Thor soaping himself had stirred his own cock; now one lazy hand coaxed it to greater hardness as he blatantly took in Thor’s own. It, too, was stirring, if not as quick. Thick and of decent length, it rested amongst dark blond hair, the balls heavy beneath. Loki caught his lower lip in teeth, hissing a breath as he pushed back his own foreskin, thumbing the slit.

“Well.” His lips curved to dangerous edge. “On with the show?”

Thor ascended the stone steps, descended again into the water. When he drew close, Loki could almost taste the salt of his uncertainty. For all his grace on the field he had been reduced now to a stuttering movement of hands, an awkward turn of body. Loki did not care. The endless expanse of skin was laid before him like inviting canvas, dusted with shimmering hair. Dribbling heady scented oil upon his fingers, he dipped his fingers low between his own thighs, shifting his hips, taking them in with practised ease.

Thor, watching, had gone very still. Loki jerked his hand, twisted his whole body with the pleasure of pressure deep inside.

“Do you see something you like?”

The war of expressions upon his handsome face could have no easy victor. “I have never done this with a man.”

Relaxing the intrusion, Loki huffed out a small laugh, let his fingers fall from his body. “What an innocent you are.”

It could only be a heartening sign, that a faint look of offense creased his brow. “I prefer untutored.”

“Well, I have known you as a quick study.”

“This is true.” The arrogance dissolved a moment later, became something far more terrifying. “Let me love you.”

A frisson danced light over his skin, the portent of coming storm. “I beg your pardon?”

“You are my king.” He paused, and Loki could hear him swallow. “Let me learn how to pleasure you.” When he glanced up, Loki found Thor’s eyes were now the dark blue of a sky bruised by relentless thunder. “Allow me your body, and you will have my soul.”

He let laughter mask the strange twisting low in his abdomen. “A warrior poet, are we?”

Thor’s own chuckle was low, bordering upon uncertain. “I would say more one who listens well to the words of those with greater skill.” The wryness of the words vanished with his next request, which held the barest hint of shyness. “Might I lay hands upon you?”

Something in him whispered of mistakes, of miscalculations. Loki kept his attention instead upon the prize. “Only if you will do as I say.”

“As you wish.”

For all the peculiar sentiment of his earlier words, Loki still expected something hard, something rough – something closer to the tempered violence of their duel upon the padded floor of the salle. When they retired to his chambers, Loki perching himself upon a high-backed chair not so far from a throne, Thor instead reached for him with a peculiar tenderness he almost shied away from.

Yet Loki held his place, fingers resting light over the padded arms. Dropping to the floor, a knight errant prostrate before his king, Thor placed open palms over Loki’s knees, gentling his thighs apart so he might fit even his great body between them. But there on his knees, he did not move forward. Rather, he pressed a chaste kiss to the instep of one foot. Swallowing back a startled sound, Loki held his silence as Thor moved scarcely upward. There he nuzzled lightly the outside of one elegant foot, tongue tracing light over a strikingly sensitive curve of ankle.

Then, like a phoenix cresting the horizon, he rose; the bristle of his beard traced along the outside of his thigh, provoking a full-bodied shiver that Loki had no hope of suppressing. Lips echoed the hollows of a well-muscled abdomen, seeking upwards with an agonising thoroughness. Beneath such ministration nipples gentled to hardness, fingertips curling to palm as knuckles grazed reverent lips.

With hands upon his waist, their span so great as to almost bind him right round, Loki allowed himself to be guided upwards. But when Thor applied just enough pressure to invite him to turn around, Loki declined without words. Instead he crossed the room, letting his hips shift in undulating tease. There, before the wide arching windows, he braced his hands, and leaned forward. A glance backward told him of Thor’s approach, low and predatory, golden skin taut over tightened muscle.

He let the laughter come then, low and throaty, even as he turned to where golden Ásgarðr glittered wild beneath them both. Thor’s answering growl was raw, rumbling like brontide. Locking his elbows, Loki tilted back his hips, was met by one opened palm against swell of buttock. It cradled him there for a worshipful second, then the second hand rose to do the same. Then, as he caught his lower lip between sharp teeth, Thor gentled them apart. The kiss he placed there stole all his breath in a single painful second. His own earlier preparation could be but nothing in the face of Thor’s work now.

Yet Loki could never be without words for long. “I believe you mentioned having never done this with a man.”

“I said nothing of what I have done with women, your majesty.”

A choking laugh was all he managed at first; a tongue moving past tight furled muscle left him breathless, near stuttering. “I…believe you have me there.”

The low hum of agreement jolted through him as lightning, nails scraping at gilded stone as hands clenched to fists. He had said at the outset Thor would do as asked – but here the warrior had stolen all demand from him, meeting every need before it had come fully even to his own mind.

But he pressed him back one more time, standing as if in a dream state. He chose their destination, moving before the hearth that dominated the entire western wall of his sitting room. No flame burned there this spring afternoon, but the warmth of Thor close behind was enough to set his blood to a roiling heat. Dropping down with regal grace learned from the cradle, Loki assumed his place on hands and knees; fingers clenched at the furs in trembling anticipation. Again, he glanced behind. Thor stood very still, feet at the width of shoulders, cock hard and leaking against his stomach.

Loki smiled. “Fuck me hard.”

Ever the natural-born soldier, Thor took his orders with gratifying swiftness. With knees pressed into calves, Thor grasped Loki’s hips, drew his own forward. The slide of hot flesh along the damp crease of his ass drew forth a keen from Loki’s tight throat. The catch of the head against twitching muscle had him dropping chin to chest, back arching, fingers tight and aching. A demand might have ripped forth into electric air, even as blunt thumbs dug into tender flesh either side of his spine, fingers splayed over his waist. But then, it was over – then, he was _in_.

The pressure of it burned, from the tail of his spine all the way up to the kaleidoscope disorder of his thoughts. Loki could not hold himself up. Supporting his forehead on the tangle of his forearms, he pressed one heated cheek against the fur, gasping for breath from air that had turned thick with heady scent of sex. Behind and above, callused hands slid up, pressing into shoulders as Thor found the first stuttering indications of rhythm. Then, they formed a cradle of unexpected tenderness, one thumb pressed to the line of his jaw, fingertips light upon the burning skin of his face. Loki could not resist the flick of his tongue over a knuckle, baring his teeth to hear the gasping chuckle from above.

Then weight of him bore down hard, chest pressed tight to back, strong hips and thighs crushing tight to the more acute angle of his own. Every thrust forward provoked a dragging shift of hard flesh inside him. In answer Loki clenched down hard, revelling in the groan rumbling between them; sweat soaked skin caught, pulled, skirted the edge of pain. Desperation rendered the sensation unimportant, yet Loki distantly caught a sense of Thor’s wish to stop – to hold him close and keep this moment. But the berserker spirit of him drove ever forward, searing them both with electric burn.

Even with mind and flesh both hazed with pleasure, Loki found it all too easy to slip the bonds of body and observe from the outside. Even in a bodiless state he trembled to see them together: his own pale flesh, curving back against the golden marble glistening above. Now Loki held his fists clenched, arms tucked beneath to cushion the weight thrusting above. Thor had extended one straining arm to hold them aloft, the other curled about Loki’s chest. Blunt nails dug into the meat of shoulder, branding tender flesh with bruises the colour of darkest red wine.

Beneath the curling ends of Loki’s hair, Thor had buried his face in the hollow of his spine, breathing ragged, damp with sweat and spit. This angle provided Loki with an exquisite view: the clench of working buttock, the heave of thigh, the fine curve of firmly muscled calf as toes bent back to gain deeper purchase. Loki himself was at the centre of it all, and yet could not help but be seduced by the pure beauty of watching. His arousal anchored him, growing in demand and desire, but it was so _hard_ to go back. His body twisted and trembled, every gasping breath punctuated by demands of _harder, faster, fuck me, fuck me so hard_ – and yet he stood as, an interloper observing the great beauty of these two together.

The darkest part of him spoke now, low and mocking, wondering why he had agreed to such debasement so easily. And yes, he might be _him_ : Loki, Prince of Ásgarðr, regent in the absence of the Allfather – but it still somehow seemed not enough. Thor had never struck him as a man swayed by position or power. And while Loki knew himself attractive, he had never once come close to the golden ideal Thor himself embodied so well. And he himself had spoken of his women—

Thor’s golden head lifted, eyes flashing silver, and then, a _bite_ – the shock of it drew Loki back home. Mind muddled, roiling with thought and sensation, he let out a gasping sigh. Thor could not have known that Loki had ever left. Yet he struck harder, deeper. With a mewling disregard of his own dignity, Loki shifted his hips up, back; it gave Thor better angle, but also allowed him to close one trembling hand about his own cock. Fisting over-sensitised flesh shuddered aching pleasure through every nerve ending, but Thor allowed him not room enough to move. It did not matter. Thor still hit the sweetest of places deep in his body with every rolling thrust of powerful hips.

Loki found his climax first. It was only proper. Again with that odd affection Thor held him through the shudders, his own hips twitching, cock still hard in Loki’s overwrought body. Only when Loki had gone slack and sweet did he make to pull out. Loki clenched down with a strength his languid state could not belie, laughed at the choking breath that so muzzled Thor’s words of surprise.

“Come inside me.”

Thor made no attempt at words this time. But his lips traced a known pattern against Loki’s skin as the great body shuddered, as sudden warmth filled him deep.

_As you wish_.

After, languidly sprawled on his back, Loki watched as the other climbed to his feet. Thor had become awkward, but still beautiful in his nude state, the very pinnacle of Asgardian physical perfection. Again, the rawest darkness of Loki’s mind spoke clear.

_He would have little use of you, if not for the crown upon your head. Send him away, deny him his place amongst the Einherjar. You should not have allowed this to happen. It should not have been this way._

Loki rolled his tongue around his mouth, tasting bitter gall even as Thor passed a hand back through the sweat-damp tangle of his hair. “I apologise,” Thor said, low and raw as if he’d screamed out his release. “It was not what you said you wished of me.”

_And if I wish for it again?_

“No, it was not,” Loki said instead, one eyebrow arched languid and high. “But surely you saw that I took my pleasure.”

Blue-bright eyes were drawn downward; Loki could feel where they fixed upon the place where his own spill still dried upon his stomach. The flush crept up his throat, hoarsened the single word of reply. “Yes.”

He could play with this one for hours. Yet Loki feared not that the novelty would wear off – but that it would deepen, sharpen. Waving one hand with a nonchalance which ran only skin deep, he made his last demand of the evening. “Bathe, then, and dress.”

With a low bow of a golden head, Thor took his orders. When he returned, hair dark and damp and curling about his shoulders, he had clothed himself once more in his loincloth. The leather cloak dangled from one great fist. Loki, lounging in his chair, wore only a heavy damask robe. Saying nothing, he only curled his lips to a sharper smile, and waited for Thor to clear his throat.

“I shall take my leave, then.”

Loki’s grin widened. “I shall see you tomorrow, in the arena.” He held that careful casual indolence even as he knew it would be best should they never meet again. “I look forward to your success.”

Thor’s bow went very low. “Your majesty.”

For no reason logic could excuse Loki rose from his chair, stepped past Thor so he might lead the other to the grand chamber doors. With a flick of the wrist they opened wide; Loki did not look to see how Thor would react to such casual use of seiðr. Folding arms over chest, Loki stood wordless as Thor moved away into the corridor. Almost immediately a page appeared, weighed down by an armful of overflowing basket. Loki’s eyes narrowed, but a breathless explanation already spilled from the young man’s mouth.

“A gift from the queen, your majesty!”

Fruits, nuts, glazed pastries and rich dense bread – all specialities of distant Vanaheimr. Loki reached forward, and his hand paused above the feast. Yes, a feast indeed – never one to be enjoyed alone. Even knowing that, Loki still did not know why he raised his head, voice clear and clarion down the length of hall.

“Thor!”

A pause, and he turned back. A look of faint surprise flittered across his face, but Loki looked only to the hint of amusement in those silver-blue eyes. With the scent of Frigga’s gift breathed in like heavy perfume, he felt giddy, strangely disconnected from decision and consequence.

“Dine with me.”

The words formed no request. They were no simple invitation, with right of refusal. Thor still smiled as brilliantly as the sun.

“As you wish.”

_It_ is _my wish_ , Loki thought as he closed the door hard on the surprised features of the page. But he still wondered if it was the kind of wish one could only regret making, even when it came so dizzyingly true.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something I really must link at the start of this chapter: @schaudwen's [absolutely gorgeous illustration of Frigga and baby!Loki](http://schaudwenart.tumblr.com/post/146708139462/lokisergi-all-mother-frigga-and-asgards), simply because a) it's lovely and b) Loki has some wistful thoughts about his beloved mother in this chapter.
> 
> And then, he has some rather more _lustful_ thoughts about Thor, instead.
> 
> Heh.

It ought to have looked ridiculous: a creature the size of Thor, draped in the lounging robe of one as lean and lithe as Loki. Yet he wore it with an honest grace. But with it belted loose about his narrow waist, the embroidered collar did not quite meet at the chest – and the slender section of skin which remained between was perhaps even more of a distraction than if he’d just remained shirtless in the first place.

Smothering a cough, having caught himself staring yet again, Loki averted his eyes to the sparkling beverage in his hand. He didn’t have to look to know Thor was grinning. He just didn’t know why it didn’t bother him even a little at all.

“You are familiar with the fare of Vanaheimr,” he said, sudden; they were the first real conversational words spoken since he had located the robe and sat down to the set table, himself once again fully dressed. Yet for all their simple meaning, when Loki glanced up he found Thor pausing over his bread, knife loaded with duck pâté, eyes fixed and staring.

Then, he resumed the motion with a deft hand. “The family which took me in are originally from Vanaheimr,” he said, too light to be easy; Loki’s frown bisected his brow.

“And what of your own family?”

“Dead, or at least presumed so.”

“I am sorry for your loss.”

The great shoulders moved in only a small shrug; he did not seem disturbed by the formality of the words. Yet Thor never seemed unaware of the difference in their stations, for all the peculiarities of Loki’s recent behaviour. “It happened when I was very young – too young to remember, as a matter of fact. Lord Gagnráðr had known my father well, and when my parents’ passing left me without a home, he willingly took me into his own.”

“A good man.”

The knife was set down across the plate, a careful move more suited to a diplomatic dinner than something more intimate. “Very much so.” Here he paused, and Loki did not understand why; his blue eyes seemed caught between uneasiness and contentment. “Also, it gained me a brother.”

A strange frisson shot across his skin, like the pull of a new thread into a weave already upon the loom. “A brother?”

This time he simply smiled, the strange expression of earlier evaporated like spring rain. “His name is Hogun. He is somewhat older than I am.” Taking a bite of the thick toast, Thor added thoughtfully around one mouthful, “I can put the credit for much of my discipline into his capable hands.”

Unable to stop himself, Loki rolled his eyes; Thor’s answering grin amused him more than he felt willing to confess. “I do not believe I have heard his name before,” he remarked instead, one hand idly playing with a fork; after setting the remainder of the bread aside, Thor pursed his lips.

“He spends much of his time in the country. He has never had any desire to come to Glaðsheimr.” Again, he seemed troubled by something just beyond Loki’s reach. “He says his place is back home.”

“But yours is not.”

The broad face lit up like a lantern, lending him a near-childish sweetness. “I do hope that’s true.” With a cough, as if realising his expression, he added with hurried reverence: “But the Norns will dictate the path of our lives, and we will walk it as best we can.”

Loki tapped a long finger upon his plate. “I rather imagine you would run it. At some considerable speed.”

“Well.” The chuckle rumbled around his chest, resounding and amused. “That all depends on what lies around the next corner.”

Looking down, Loki could feel something like a blush creeping up from his collar; cursing his pale complexion, he scowled hard. Only then did he reach for a fruit, hitting it entirely off centre when he speared it with a skewer. He ate several pieces in total silence before he spoke again.

“My mother had all this sent to me from Vanaheimr. She is travelling there.”

Thor appeared undisturbed by the prolonged pause in the conversation; it made Loki wonder what his home life had truly been like. “The queen is a remarkable person,” he offered, and Loki smiled with soft joy.

“She would like you.”

The smile vanished as soon as he’d spoken the spontaneous words. Loki had startled himself – from a very young age, he had never liked to share his mother, though given her duty he in truth shared her with the realm entire. But as his mother: in that respect, Frigga could be only his alone. He could not imagine why he would wish to share _that_ with a near-stranger.

In return, Thor only nodded, seemingly undisturbed by the cool change of Loki’s mood. “It would be an honour indeed to be in her presence. You are fortunate to have her for a mother – as we are all fortunate indeed to have her as our queen.”

The sting of tears had him clenching his teeth, taking his next piece of fruit with enough force the sharp end of the skewer scraped the plate. It was accompanied by only the slightest hint of shame; he knew it to be ridiculous, missing her so when she had been gone for scarce weeks. The regency alone ought to take up enough of his time and concentration to permit him little time to mourn her absence. And they had spoken nearly every day besides.

“I thank the Norns every day for gifting her to me,” he said, honest. Thor’s brilliant returned smile still held a hint of sadness. It made him wonder if Thor had any physical reminders of his own mother, but found he had no words with which to ask. They returned quietly to their meals, the clink of cutlery, the muted movement of food from platter to plate to lips.

“I must be less than stimulating as a conversational partner.”

Glancing up, Loki only just caught himself from dropping his fork. “Why do you say that?”

“You are the crown prince of Ásgarðr – warrior and seiðmaðr both, heir to the legacy of Odin Allfather.” Though he wasn’t smiling, Loki still heard an odd affection in those words, one not always shared by his other subjects. “I have heard stories of your wit and cunning since childhood. You are but a little younger than I, and yet you have travelled the realms and seduced them all.”

Making a scornful sound low in his throat, Loki reached for the water pitcher. “I am sure many would rather call it something of a rough wooing.”

“That can be pleasant enough, under the right circumstance.”

Sudden heat twisted in his belly. Taking a knife, Loki kept both his silence and his eyes upon Thor. Casual as he was about his work in disembowelling a starfruit, but there was nothing subtle in its open display of skill.

Bur Thor surprised him. “I always wanted to speak with you.”

The fruit he put aside, untouched. “We spoke very early on, in the games.”

“No, no.” Though he began by using his hand in a dismissive wave, he aborted the motion and soon used it to retrieve a particularly plump plum. “I saw you, once.”

“Once?”

It appeared Thor was in fact building a small cairn of stonefruit upon his plate. “When we were children. Your father and his retinue rode through the plains very near our village. We all came to watch.”

It gave Loki no real context; Thor had never once named the area where he lived, and Loki had accompanied Odin on many excursions beyond Glaðsheimr’s golden halls. “I suppose we would have been the excitement of the season,” he said, slow, and Thor’s booming laughter nearly made him jump from his chair.

“Preferable to pigshit and the corn harvest, certainly,” he said cheerfully, though it turned serious with but a moment’s passage. The too-bright eyes fixed his from across the table, the way a predator’s approach might immobilise its prey. “Yes. I _remember_ you.”

The shiver tripped down his spine like cracks through thin ice. “Truly.”

“Oh, yes.” The flat tone did nothing to blunt his enthusiasm. “I felt…like I should have been with you. Beside you. The knight and his prince, riding across the realms in search of adventure and glory.”

“That’s a very nice story.” The water parched his dry throat but a little. “Much as I doubt its veracity, perhaps.”

“You don’t have to believe it.” Thor took a sip from his own glass, filled with sweet blended juice. “I lived it. That was enough.” Now his smile turned crooked. “Or it was, until we met.”

At last Loki set the knife down. Unintentional as it was, he sounded more curious more than predatory. “What do you imagine this is?”

That shrug, again; it frustrated Loki as much as it fascinated him. _Oh, to be so carefree!_ he thought with bitter jealousy, even as Thor continue to smile.

“I imagine it is whatever you wish it to be,” Thor said with a guile that seemed almost too easy; Loki could not resist poking a little further beneath that perfect skin.

“And _your_ wish?”

“Is unimportant.” Loki’s narrowed eyes could disturb kings in their thrones; Thor sat before him, merely thoughtful. “And I have already told it to you.”

And he had sounded almost gentle. Still, a flare of irritation twisted Loki’s lips. “There is no need to spin half-truths or lies to gain my patronage, Thor. I have already told you that no commander in their right mind would deny you a place in the Einherjar.”

One finger pushed at the pile of untouched fruit built upon the bread. “You are my king.” He took the plum from the top, held it across the space between them. “I would not lie to you.”

Loki stared at it. “I am only regent.” There was a challenge in his eyes, sharp and set. “My father is the king.”

With that easy sleight of hand that served him so well in the arena, Thor gently set the plum down beside Loki’s unmoving hand. “And so shall you be, in time.” Settling back into his chair, Thor crossed his arms over his chest; the fabric pulled taut, the lines of his throat somehow vulnerable even above the hard muscle. “Is it wrong, for me to wish to see it with my own eyes?”

His fingers toyed absently with the fruit. “You are very strange.”

“People have been telling me that since I was a child, yes.”

Again, he knew he should be annoyed at the casual tone – at how Thor had so easily fallen into speaking as though they were friends rather than a king and his soldier, or close enough to. With a sudden scowl he snatched up the plum, sank his teeth viciously into the red flesh. Thor only watched with hooded eyes, wordless and waiting.

Loki swallowed the last bite, let the stone clatter to a saucer. “Your abilities with storm,” he demanded. “You have always had them?”

Surprise stilled him. Then, a frown of his own left him pensive; it did not suit him at all. “I have had a lifelong affinity, yes,” he says, for the first time nearly cautious. Loki saw no reason to stop.

“Did your Vanir family not teach you anything of them?”

“Yes, but…” Shifting in his chair, his eyes flicked sideways, skipped lightly over the door. “…it is part of me, I suppose. Or so I have been told. But I…I am not seiðmaðr. I am a soldier. While my lady mother attempted to teach me control, it seemed not to be.”

“So they leave it untutored and unfettered?”

The accusatory tone had him wincing. “Oh, I fetter it myself – or so they say. What you can see when I am in battle, it is but a fraction of what lies beneath.” But Loki saw no boastfulness, no pride; only troubled silver lurked in those too-blue eyes. “They say I would require a conduit, of a kind…perhaps a lightning rod, if we’re to be ironic about it. The power is within me, but it would need a channel to be released.”

Loki leaned back in his chair, unable to keep the light bite from his voice. “Fascinating.”

His head had bowed towards the table. “I thought you would say so.”

“May I?”

Now his head jerked up, eyes blinking. Yet he still reached out a hand, palm turned up in open supplication. Carefully Loki met it with the palm of his own. Thor’s eyes closed. So did his. It was a simple enough spell: probing, searching. Thor’s bright aura, always faintly visible to one of Loki’s training, flared brighter: golden and red in colour, for all his elemental power hummed silver and blue. A contrast, not quite a contradiction; Loki knew it to be no real surprise that Thor could not so easily wield such raw power. A small smile tugged at his lips. He never could resist going _just_ a little deeper.

Then he jerked, snatched his hand back, cradled it in the other. It did not matter. Even with the connection so rudely severed, it moved through him yet: undissipated, unrelenting. A surge of _lightning_ , cold and burning. He closed his eyes, set his jaw, hissed through his teeth. Then he looked up, saw growing panic on Thor’s face, and felt the energy subside, concentrating lower.

“Did…did I hurt you?”

“No, I…I just…” Staring at his hands, opened before him, Loki bit his bottom lip. His own power could not be called insubstantial. But what was in Thor was different. It was _greater_ , in sheer potential if not magnitude, and for a commoner to hold such power, he was remarkable indeed—

Loki shook his head, thoughts strange and tangled. The growing ache in his groin, sparked by the coursing of current through his body entire, made theory and hypothesis irrelevant. Already his mouth had gone dry, breath coming shorter with every passing second.

“Take off your clothes.”

Thor blinked. But he stood without question. Loki almost regretted the order when he stripped off the borrowed robe. Wrapped in Loki’s own garment, he had been marked as almost a possession. But then, in his rooms, Thor stood bound yet to his word. With the taste of ozone upon his tongue, the burn of silver through his veins, Loki thought only of what was still to come.

“Where do you wish me?”

Loki bothered with no words. Standing, hands pressed flat on the broad plains of a heaving chest, Loki walked Thor backwards across the room. Then he pushed him down, naked, upon the chair.

There Loki straddled him, himself yet fully clothed. Working his calves into position upon the padded seat of the chair, Loki settled his buttocks upon the edges of Thor’s knees. Only then did he allow their eyes to meet, and did not once look away as he began to work Thor’s cock from shaft to tip. There was to be no gentle beginning, no ease into pleasure. Loki gave it hard and fast, the way made slick by a few murmured words of seiðr. His own arousal already pressed hard against the tight leather of his trousers.

Loki paid it little heed. The pleasure came rather in watching instead the darkening of rolling eyes, the wide mouth falling slightly open. The convulsive swallow of the throat, the thumping vein standing out from the broad neck; Loki chuckled to himself as Thor could not help but shift beneath him with keening need. It seemed Thor had no desire to unseat his king. But the body, glorious muscle sheening with perspiration, was utterly unable to hold still.

And oh, the _power_ in it! Loki wanted to sink his teeth deep, drink it down. But he teased it instead to the brink of release. Only then did he stand. Thor, hands upon the arms of the chair, could not move: white knuckled, chest heaving, abdomen rippling with the agony of pleasure pipped at the very last post. But he made no motion to touch himself. There was only the passage of his tongue over dry lips as Loki stripped himself bare.

“Please.”

Loki snarled. “Did I say you might speak?”

“ _Please_.”

It brought Loki pleasure and pride both, to hear such desperation wrenching free of that gloriously bared throat. Straddling him again, this time he angled his hips. The convenience of seiðr could never be as gratifying as preparing oneself, but it made such quick work of this. Sliding down, taking him in, Loki unleashed a wicked grin. In answer Thor’s head thumped back against the wooden crest at the head of the chair’s back. A moment later his eyes rolled back, leaving only a sliver of blue. Still grinning to show his teeth, Loki dug fingers into shoulders, and began to move.

Thor was saying something. It didn’t matter what is was. Here above him, Loki could feel again that remarkable wellspring of energy within Thor, roiling and restless, summer storm locked in a belljar. Loki might call it out, perhaps. He could even invite it in, given the intimacy of their current position. But even in this state Loki realised how foolhardy it would be. That which dwelled within Thor was not a power to be borrowed. Unless he sought to be consumed, this is how it would be: thrust inside, granting pleasure and heat and joy and _lo_ —

The force of the downward stroke wrought gasps from them both, louder than even the slap of skin on skin. He felt no need to fight Thor’s helpless upward thrust of hips; the tearing sound of fabric tested beyond limit only made Loki laugh. A moment later it was joined by Thor’s roar to the heavens, the feeling of spilled warmth deep inside. Slowing, panting, damp hair hanging in his eyes, Loki brought himself to a stop, forehead pressed light upon the bowed mass of Thor’s blond hair.

After a long moment Loki climbed down on unsteady legs, his cock a burning need pressed up hard against his stomach. With an open groan he threw himself down into the nearest chair, legs spread wide and shaking. Through slitted eyes he watched as Thor struggled upward, muscles trembling, dripping sweat. He only smiled to see it.

Thor tried to echo the expression, but could not; he sighed instead, the sound post-coital, exhausted by pleasure. The words near slurred when he forced them out, making a clumsy gesture towards his groin. “But you have not…”

A dip of one hand, and he had the spend from his thighs upon his fingertips. With a white flash of teeth he pressed it to his lips. Thor’s helpless keen only made him smile wider. “I will save it.”

“For _what_?”

“Your fight, tomorrow.” His hand slipped down, fingers wrapping about his cock. “I so enjoy watching you fight.”

“I…”

One pump, two, three – and he had to stop, his entire body trembling. “Think of me, then. When you are on the sands, and I…the king in his pavilion. Taking his pleasure with every strike, every parry.” Fluttering his fingers across the tight skin, he said with breathless nonchalance: “Take down your opponent, and know your glory is my release.”

Thor shuddered, as if taken by second impossible orgasm. “ _Oh_.”

And Loki only laughed, letting himself go. “You precious thing.” Shifting in the seat, he closed his eyes for just a moment, revelling in the power of it all. “I’d be quite afraid I’d worn you out, if not for the tales I have heard many a time of how sexual pleasures heighten latter physical performance.”

His laughter was raw, unchecked. “If that is true, then tomorrow I shall fight as a god.”

“Oh, I _do_ hope so.” Fixing his gaze upon him, his voice turned low, commanding. “Do not fail me, Thor.”

He moved so _quick_ for a man of his size. It brought him too close, and without invitation. Loki did not retreat, did not send him away. Thor loomed above him, faces but moments apart; in this they breathed the same air, and Loki revelled in burning taste of ozone upon his tongue. And Thor smiled, his whisper promise and oath together.

“Oh, your majesty,” and he laughed like rolling thunder. “I would not know how!”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Much as I love a decent action scene, I _always_ struggle to write them.
> 
> ...at least this one gets a happy ending. Ha.

“Ah, somebody is looking exquisite today.”

“And somebody else is looking to have his name signed to an execution warrant, I see.”

Despite the dire expression on his king’s face, the other man’s breezy tone did not alter in the slightest. “Oh, but your majesty – if _I_ did not seek to compliment you, reminding you of how very perfect you are, who else would dare do so?”

“Fandral.”

The blond beamed wider yet. “Yes?”

“Do shut up.”

Swinging out one arm to show off the embroidered patterns of the dress cape to their best potential, Fandral sketched a low and reverent bow. “As my king commands.”

Loki only just resisted the urge to flick a little seiðr his way, catching the collar of Fandral’s cloak to tighten it just a _little_ about his neck. It was best not to act too rashly. The fop amused him at times, after all.

Settling instead for a burst of violent air beside Fandral’s head, Loki watched with a passive face as Fandral straightened with a yelp. Only when Fandral turned a wounded look upon him did Loki indulge himself with a broad grin.

“Just a little trick, Fandral. Was it not to your liking?”

While his expression soured, the blue eyes danced with genuine delight. He had always been so very nearly the perfect courtier. “It was…most amusing, my liege?”

With a snort, Loki nodded towards the corridor. “Hurry. We cannot be late.”

They already were. The council gathering had gone over time; even as regent, Loki had not quite the power to dismiss it early. Or at least, he could not have done so without raising awkward questions. But moving swiftly now though he did, it was not in a manner that would surprise any who knew him. Loki was quick, Loki moved in shadow, Loki knew all.

“You are enjoying the games this year?”

He kept his eyes ahead, and Fandral kept pace with him. “Yes.”

“I hear you had one of the candidates to a match yesterday.”

“I did.”

Fandral had never known when to take a hint when it came to Loki’s disinterest in his constant badgering. “And how was he?”

“Worthy of the title.”

Even at the speed they moved, Fandral managed a deep belly laugh. “Ooh,” he said, and ducked the hand Loki didn’t bother to swipe at his face. “I _do_ hope he wins.” Again his eyes held that damnable twinkle as he added, easily, “Thor, isn’t it?”

“Indeed.”

“Sif has taken quite a fancy to him.”

Loki didn’t bother to mask the ice of his returned tone. “I am certain Sif has more pressing matters to attend to.”

“Recruitment among them,” Fandral agreed with lazy satisfaction, though Loki caught the frown tagged at the end of it. “I have never seen him amongst the candidates before. Is it his first time, do you know?”

“As far as I am aware.”

For a moment Fandral almost hesitated – then his fleet steps, encased in richest tooled leather, brought him equal with Loki once more. “A remarkable talent, then. Most of these country types falter when they’re first brought to the city. Not enough experience of structured battle.”

Loki did not realise how tightly his lips had pressed together until he tried to speak through them. “I believe he comes from a martial family.”

“That would help him, certainly.” Simple curiosity actually outweighed bawdiness when he then added, “Do you wish him for your own personal guard?”

He didn’t mean to pause. Still he did, and regretted what conclusions Fandral might erroneously draw from it. “Perhaps in time,” Loki said, very even. “As you say, those from the country do need to experience more of the city before they are true Einherjar.”

“I am sure he will be given the chance.”

Upon reaching the arena they took their seats with swift efficiency; servants already hovered at their elbows to offer food and wine. Loki accepted neither, focusing only upon the tableau below. Fandral sat close by, a court lady to his left hand, full goblet in the right. Loki rolled his eyes and ignored him along with all the others in the royal box. For all he had spoken to Thor of taking his pleasure in the pavilion, it was an unlikely supposition – unless he cast a diversion over himself, at any rate. And yet it felt unimportant enough in this moment that he almost did not care. For now he would be content to watch.

Due to the lateness of their arrival they had already missed many of the morning’s trials; a few more remained and were played out before a banquet was served as a midday meal. Again, Loki sampled only little of what was on offer. Even around the sweetness of his mead he could still taste the tart juice of the plum from the night before.

As the trumpets sounded he willingly set his plate aside, unfinished. Thor had fought several bouts already. Now he would engage in something much more to the liking of a restless crowd.

It would be a test of strength and endurance. No weapons would be brought to hand. Instead Thor faced his opponent simply as he was: a glorious creature, shining and golden, barefoot and clad only in his loincloth. With his hair bound back, Loki could see his eyes clearly, a bright and blazing blue even at such distance. The memory of the power coiled inside him like some great slumbering serpent sent a shiver along Loki’s spine. It was not entirely pleasurable; Loki had the uneasy sensation that it might be his end, one day. But then Thor’s opponent entered the ring, and all else could be but forgotten in the roar of the gathered spectators.

A creature of rock and stone towered above even Thor’s bulk and height. It had been a marauder, once, but now pled allegiance to the Æsir. Loki had faced similar creatures only on the battlefield, and then only when armed with seiðr. Most conventional weapons were of little use against them; they broke swords as if they were children’s toys, and swept aside most other mêlée attacks with an ease that could frighten the most hardened of warriors. Maces and heavy warhammers often proved themselves of some advantage, but generally the most important quality was to be swift on one’s feet. Such was not an easy task with heavy weaponry to hand. Warriors of Loki’s type instead were the most effective, combining speed and spells that worked through disruption; Loki himself favoured sound waves to weaken or outright shatter the rock from which they were constructed.

Thor _was_ remarkably fast, that much was true. And he was very strong, which could make up for a distinct lack of easily accessible and honed seiðr. But this was a trial set up for failure. No other initiate had ever passed it. They usually only brought it out for those of Thor’s calibre, just to see how long they might last. The crowds always enjoyed it, even when their favourites inevitably fell against the impossible.

But Thor stood tall, glorious and golden. It was clear to all he had no intention of losing.

_They never do_.

“Shall we place bets on how long he might last?”

Leaning forward, Loki did not even look to where Fandral sat with two beauties draped on either arm. “No.”

“No?” Shaking his head, Fandral accepted a strawberry from the blonde, grinning at her as he swallowed it down. Then he shrugged. “I suppose not. You might have an unfair advantage, having studied his style up close.” When that still got no rise from him, Fandral persisted with, “Who won?”

“In the end, I did.”

His chuckle resonated with a cad’s blatant amusement. “Oh, _Loki_.”

His own eyes darkened, for all the lightness of the word. “ _Fandral_.”

Loosening his scowl, then, Loki turned his attention back to the field. Thor moved yet, circling, watchful. The stone creature held his centre, shifting to regard Thor’s movements with an almost bored expression – not that his face permitted much movement otherwise. In the blink of an eye Thor darted forward, then snapped back. It had been only a feint, but the stone elemental did not react. Even at this distance Loki clearly saw Thor’s jaw tighten.

That was the first real indication of his pride. Of course Loki knew that it had to be there; no-one of Thor’s ability, intelligence, and sheer physical beauty could be completely unaware of his own exceptional nature. Before his regent-king, he had seemed humble enough – but here he was now, before the entire court and the people of the city. Thor could have no intention of losing even what was in effect a no-win situation.

Loki almost wished he could be down there: to whisper it in his ear, fingers digging into shoulder, lips but millimetres from flushed skin. Perhaps he would never accept such truth, even from Loki. But then, if he was there, it would be different: they _would_ win. With Loki at his side, Thor could never be defeated.

Settling back into his chair, Loki let another frown curl down upon his lips. Thor had sketched a motion past the creature, forcing it to turn with a sharp jerk in order to keep its eyes upon him. It had no speed of its own, but then with mass like that Loki had no particular desire to add such momentum. With a snarl it swung out a great arm, as if batting at flies; Thor ducked easily, came around its back, aimed a heel kick to the crease of one knee. The force of the blow brought it down, angled to the left, but the right arm pushed out with crushing force. Thor only narrowly danced back, eyes dark and watchful, biceps gleaming in the soft afternoon light.

“He’s very quick.”

“And you’re very slow, if you’ve only just noticed as much.”

Fandral waved a nonchalant hand. “We cannot all be so studious as you, Loki.”

Much of the time, it was better just to ignore him. Loki found it easy enough to do considering Thor remained before him, engaged in the uneven duel below. Thor shifted warily now; Loki could see a thousand calculations moving through his mind. Then, a step back, to the side: he rushed at him with sudden suicidal speed.

Loki bit his tongue down on the word that resonated there all the same: _fool!_ But Thor feinted, all without arresting his forward momentum: he went down on one hip, sliding between the creature’s legs even as it swiped mighty hands together. One hand fisted in the sand, dragging him to a halt; within a second he was on his feet and then on its back, forcing it to its knees.

“Clever boy,” Fandral marvelled; if not for the woman cosied into his side, Loki would have kicked him hard.

“Shush.”

Fandral snickered, again – though he really ought to have known better than to try and disturb Loki’s pleasure when watching a good fight. Brow furrowed, Loki attempted once more to focus solely upon Thor and his opponent. What he had chosen to do might have been a good tactic with a bigger enemy; with one arm looped about the great neck, Thor had formed a chokehold that could not be easily shaken off. But then the nature of the creature meant it could not be so easy to disrupt its breathing in such a way. The neck was armoured and unforgiving, and Thor could not hold on forever.

Hunched forward, the stone elemental shook its entire body like a dog casting off water. Though his muscles clearly strained Thor held on tight; already the crowd had surged to its feet, hooting and hollering and heated. Loki sat very still in his chair, hands clenched at the ends of the gilded arms, nails curled into the gold so hard as to drive them back under the skin.

Finally it threw him off. Curled into a ball to minimise impact, Thor rolled too far across the arena, thumping up against the weathered granite of its side. The crowd screamed, bloodlust stirred to boiling point. Loki cursed under his breath. Now in a crumpled heap, Thor lay unmoving.

_So easy, then?_ he thought, and tasted bitter gall against the back of his tongue. Fandral let out a low whistle, and it was all he could do not to throw something at his beautifully coiffed head. But then, the crowd had drawn itself to hysterical anticipation, eyes fixed upon the area with bloodthirsty glee.

Now the stone creature stomped towards him, and still Thor did not move. One great hand opened, reaching down, the crushing promise of it close and inevitable. Loki bit down upon a curse, and wondered how he could have been so very damned wrong.

And Thor looked up with eyes blazing lightning storm. It paused, if only for the barest of seconds. That was enough. Thor barrelled into it with one shoulder, sending it sprawling. Around him the crowd’s gasp shimmered for an impossible moment, then erupted into screams of violent delight. Standing back, Thor’s entire body seemed to blaze to life with silver-struck light; he threw his head back, and _howled_. Beside him, Fandral drew a sharp breath.

“He is berserker.”

_Berserker_. The word rolled around Loki’s mind, hard and heavy in its consequence. But externally Loki only frowned, seated half-forward in his seat, eyes fixed upon the gleaming skin of the creature below. The sky above roiled with sudden uneasy cloud. And Fandral shook his head; even from the corner of his eye, Loki could see his clear unhappiness.

“Did you know that?”

There was no rain, but Loki could feel his hair beginning to curl in the thickening air. “I suspected as much.”

“The match should be called off,” he said, shaking his head once more; the women had drawn back from him, eyes wide where Thor’s beauty held them mesmerised. Loki cocked his head to the arena, snorted.

“Do _you_ wish to go in there and tell him so?”

Fandral chuckled, again. “Perhaps Týr will do it.”

The two combatants stood but desperate moments apart, caught in sudden impasse. Thor, shoulders heaving, eyes silvered, had his lips curled back from his teeth as if he could already scent the blood he sought. Loki himself could taste the crackle of ozone on the air. The crowd, hushed now, leaned forward in one great mass, ravenous for more. The stone elemental stood still as any mountain, waiting, watchful, immutable.

The bell rang loud enough to crack the air itself. The entire arena groaned in once voice, disappointment harsh and frustrated. The end of the match had been called; all was over. Thor started, a dreamer struck from sleep. Then fury flooded him, hunched his shoulders, hands closed to hard fists. He did not look away from the stone creature even as another joined the field. Týr, commander of the armies, crossed the sands in full regalia, head high and eyes dark.

“Congratulations, Thor son of Gagnráðr. You have come as close as any in this match. But it ends now.”

There came a single dreadful moment where Loki believed Thor would lay the other flat, and then return that rage upon the creature. Even the king’s word could not have saved him then. Exiled back to the country, there would be nothing more for Thor in Glaðsheimr. The broad chest heaved with storm-riddled air, eyes blazing with the heat of lightning strike. Loki’s own breath had become but a motionless moment caught in an aching throat.

Then Thor set his jaw, turned, and left.

“Well.” Fandral let out a long, low breath. “ _That_ could have been quite the battle.”

Loki stood, turned, and moved like the wind. A shout from Fandral rose up behind him. He paid it no heed. Moving down the stairs, he parted with presence alone the crush of people about the arena. The area closed off to all but competitors and their attendants awaited him. Gaining initial entry was easy enough, but when he demanded to be taken to Thor he found his passage soured.

“Your majesty, you cannot—”

His fingers twitched, their tips gleaming with spilt-over energy. “Do you truly mean to tell the king what he may and may not do?”

Like a daisy denied sun and water, the hapless guard wilted with faint and miserable hope. “He is most likely in isolation. I simply—”

“Take me there.”

A different guard held his place outside the cooldown chamber; deeply delineated features and grey-speckled hair marked him as one of those well accustomed to the games and their idiosyncrasies. His peaceful stance echoed that fact; the old man knew all too well that Thor was hardly the first to demonstrate instability upon the field. All Æsir, whether they sought to access it or not, always held some degree of seiðr within them. Slumber deep though the power might, high emotion and strong passion could unleash it upon individual and crowd alike. Usually it presented little real danger; such latent energy often proved undeveloped enough for its awakening to be but a passing curiosity.

_But then Thor is still waiting to win the battle they forced him to lose._

“Your majesty.”

Only when he spoke did the guard’s unease appear, though his hands remained steady upon the bevelled staff he held. Loki blinked, just once. “I would speak with the warrior within.”

Though the guard hesitated still, Loki sensed no scorn from him – personal, or professional. This one knew Loki for the master seiðmaðr he was. But then he also knew the spirit of the berserker better than most – and presumably, had seen Thor brought in.

_But I am your king_.

The old man bowed his head, sudden and simple. “I will be here,” were his only words. And then he unlocked the door, and stood aside.

The chamber had only narrow windows along its highest point; the light that pierced through barely illuminated the pacing creature below. A heavy clang and click heralded the closing of the door; Loki paid it no heed. Energy, furious and frustrated, radiated from Thor with a power Loki could not help but find intoxicating. In this, Thor was more caged beast than man: Loki half expected the walls to shake from the force of his footfall, the roar of his every laboured breath.

“Thor.”

He turned with the harassed speed of a carnivore at his hunt. Face twisted into a snarl, he hunched forward, eyes blazing. A second of silence passed, pregnant and predatory. The crackling of charged air beat hot against Loki’s skin. The fine hairs at the nape of his neck had twitched upward, trembling. Loki himself held his ground. The blaze of Thor’s eyes held him entranced: too blue, too silver, too _perfect_.

A grin flashed across his handsome face, one that showed all his teeth. Then, he moved across the room with the simple fury of charge along a wire. Loki’s back hit the wall, startling a sound from him. With hands already at his collar, Thor ripped apart mail and leather in a single great motion. The panting mouth latched upon a nipple, _bit_. With a smile, Loki closed his eyes. His hands rose, fingers digging deep into the damp hair before him, and he held on tight.

Even Loki could not hold him long. The thrum of energy, violent storm-fury, coursed through Thor’s entire body as if he were but conductor to endless lightning strike. Already he moved to fumble at Loki’s belt, forcing the trousers down just enough to pull his cock into his mouth. And Loki recalled dimly that Thor had spoken of never having done this with men, but _oh_ – oh, what an instinctive student he proved.

Starting at the head, Thor pushed at the foreskin, tongue ghosting over the slit. Even with Loki’s fingers scrabbling for greater purchase he then moved back, lips pursed; dragging over the skin of its full length, he left the shaft slick and shining. With an ending flicker of tongue over the balls, he started over by engulfing the head and first inch. Loki groaned to feel a slide up and down. Even in this state Thor could not take him deep. But still it felt just nearly enough. Again he drew away, not caring about the sharp entanglement of Loki’s fingers in his knotted hair.

Adrift in desire, Loki allowed Thor to pull him down. A cold and hard floor awaited him. He did not care. It burned against the skin of chest and belly as he bunched his fists, tilting hips upward. The smile stretched far enough to bleed as large hands grasped rough at his buttocks, spreading them wide, a low growl shivering along his skin as hot breath came quick and close.

 Thor’s beard burned where he buried it in the crease of his ass. One hand insinuated itself low between his thighs, under his hips; it began to work his cock in quick thrusts even as the tongue began its teasing work. Loosening, darting in, out; without warning Thor switched to something very much like open mouthed kisses, saliva slick over Loki’s skin and within his hole. Then, again, the tongue thrust into him with hard demanding purpose. Loki dug nails into dirt, bit back on a keening cry, and failed.

A moment more, he found himself turned over, head dizzied by motion and sensation alike. Thor rose above him: glorious, golden, silver storm roiling in his gleaming eyes. A low growl, again, and his trousers had been ripped clear away. It left his lower half bare and vulnerable. In answer Loki only gave a lazy grin, spread his legs wider. The silvered-mad eyes widened, then narrowed. The smile curved higher still to see his challenge accepted.

Hands like manacles closed about his ankles; Thor wrenched his legs so far apart Loki felt his pelvis groan at the strain. Then he pressed in. There was no pause, no care. In answer Loki arched his back with a harsh gasping breath; he earned a nipple closed between teeth for his trouble. Even as he fought for breath his lower thighs were caught in bruising grasp, one that raised both legs and hips alike. Hands scrabbled for purchase on the stone floor, blunt nails finding no anchor, but it was no matter. Thor yanked him closer yet, abdomen shoved up against his, cock as deep as it would go. The pain was but a dull throb behind the glory of it all.

 Then Thor pounded hard into him. With his knees forced up, doubled over, Loki could scarcely catch a breath; already his mind muddied at the edges, dizzied with dark desire. Before, Thor had so carefully angled himself, seeking out Loki’s pleasure with a servant’s devotion to his master. Nothing of that now remained. He moved for himself, animalistic and raw and _beautiful_.

And he was beautiful, even with his tangled hair all but masking the broad lines of his face. Then he thrust it forward, teeth digging into the flesh of his armpit. Gasping, grasping, Loki fought for control, lost it; he could taste blood in his mouth from where he’d bitten his cheek.

As he swallowed back on the ferric tang of it, Thor came hard, entire great body shuddering against him. His heated skin seemed far too thin and fragile to hold the roiling spirit of storm and thunder than beat against it from the inside. Loki closed his eyes, gasped out his own breath as Thor withdrew, believing it over. But Thor remained on his knees, between his thighs. Three fingers drove hard and uninvited into his ass. Loki thumped his head back against the packed dirt, hard enough to see stars even before the hot mouth closed hungrily on his cock.

In the end, Loki came back to himself slowly. Something deep inside him carolled a low protest as he levered himself upward, but there was more interesting prey afoot: Thor, head bowed, stood motionless on the opposite side of the room. Though the air tasted still faintly of ozone, Thor himself had almost seemed to _shrink_ , the storm dissipated and gone. He had already retrieved his loincloth, settling it about his hips, but given its styling Loki could see how his hands must have trembled as he did so. Yet his voice managed something very even when he spoke first.

“I can bring you towels, and water.”

The sound of it rang hollow, and strange; it sat completely at odds with the easy cheeriness Loki had always thought intrinsic to his person. Frowning, he wriggled his hips back into his own trousers, pushing himself to his feet. The wall provided more support than he would care to admit, but his voice held nothing but command when he said, “Bring yourself.”

Without hesitation, Thor did. Careful and slow, he crossed the room; Loki wondered if the exertion of his berserker rage had taxed that great body beyond endurance – but only before the moment Thor went to his knees, head bowed nearly to the floor.

“I am sorry.”

Loki had the distinct impression the expression on his own face would have been comical – had Thor been able to see it. “For what?”

“I lost control.”

He didn’t hold back his bark of laughter, short and humourless. “And I liked it.”

The unkindness of it was worth it, for Thor looked up with eyes wide and startled. They would not have been out of place upon the features of a hare with its foot caught in a snare. But it did not last; already they narrowed, flickering quick over what skin he could see. From his throat to the low hang of unbelted trousers, Loki could feel himself a mass of fresh bruises, some already purpling to near-black. But the sting of them felt distant, unimportant. Rather, Loki watched him take shameful account, and let out a snort.

“If I had not wanted this, I could have dematerialised. I could have shackled you. I could have _killed_ you.”

In silence, Thor returned his gaze to the dirt at his feet. Twisting his lips, Loki then allowed them to curve into a fierce grin composed almost entirely of teeth.

“Thor. I can defend myself.”

“I…” Again he stopped, seemingly unable to locate the words he wanted. One open-palmed hand moved back through his hair; he grimaced, fingers tangling in the damp ruin of it. But he tried again. In that, Loki began to suspect Thor truly did not know the meaning of surrender. “It is not that. I don’t doubt that you can.” This time he met Loki’s eyes, his clear guilt a strange and fragile thing. “I just have no desire to hurt you.”

Wordless, Loki raised his left hand. Even with the sleeves reaching nearly to his hands, Thor had left bracelets of bruises about his slender strong wrists. The skin of his neck, his abdomen, his thighs: all prickled with the memory of teeth, of dug in nails. When he smiled, it was without humour, but not devoid of amusement.

“I believe I would debate that, Thor.”

He grimaced, looked away. “No, I…”

One hand snapped out, caught his chin. With a rough motion Loki forced his eyes up, met them with a dark scowl. “You are the berserker.” He shook his hand, uncaring of muscles in neck and throat. “You mustn’t deny it. It is a strength, and a glorious one.”

Thor had gone very still, eyes very blue – as wide as the summer sky. “Like your seiðr?”

Dropping his hand, Loki drew back as if Thor’s very skin had turned to flame. He did not even realise he’d taken several steps backward until Thor raised a hand, then dropped it but a moment later. His head had bowed again, eyes fixed upon the open palmed hands lying in his lap.

“I meant no insult. I know there are others who would. But…” Now when he looked up, his smile was wry, and very tired. “…you are the son of Odin One-Eye. He is seiðmaðr and warrior both. How could his son be less? Why would Ásgarðr _desire_ less?”

The movement of his fingers at his own belt were clumsy and uneven, though the words were not. “You are remarkably broad-minded for a country squire.”

“I did say my family are of the Vanir.” With a sigh, Thor pushed to his feet; though he kept silent, Loki did not miss the wince of pain that crossed his face before he turned away. He let him drink his fill from the fountain before he spoke again.

“You did not do anything I did not wish of you.”

Thor had stilled, and did not turn. “That is what frightens me.”

“I cannot picture you being afraid of anything.”

For a moment the broad planes of his back trembled in a most peculiar way. Then he turned, and Loki realised he was _laughing_. “We are all afraid of something,” he said, and sobered but a moment later. “I am sorry. I speak out of turn.”

“If I took issue with it I would say so.”

Thor nodded, just once. In the quiet that followed, he stared off into the middle distance of a room that would not be large enough to accommodate even one of Loki’s wardrobes.

“If I become Einherjar,” he said, sudden, “it will be when the summer changes.”

“ _When_.” His own body felt to have been through a meat grinder. It was _delicious_. “One loss will not hold you back.”

Again, he appeared to give great thought to his words before he spoke again. “I will go home for the summer. Tend to my affairs, pack up my things, come back to the city in the autumn.”

“And you will say a personal goodbye to all the generously endowed wenches panting for your return?”

The mocking tone appeared to have no effect on him. When Thor spoke, it was with a child’s open urgency. “Would you come?” He paused, winced, tried again. “I mean…the Allfather will awaken soon, yes? And you…you could come. If it pleased you.”

Loki blinked, just once. “What?”

“I _want_ you to come.” This time he actually covered his mouth, but the blurted words had already escaped. When he dropped his hand, his lips had twisted into something between rueful grin and outright grimace. “I am sorry. I should not have said that.”

He had almost set his clothing to rights again, but here he stopped, eyes fixed upon Thor alone. “So why did you?”

He only shrugged, helpless. “I wanted to.”

A dozen different replies flickered at the tip of his tongue. Loki chose not one of them. “I must return to the pavilion,” he said, sudden and short. “Make yourself decent. They will be announcing appointments this evening, yours among them.”

“Your majesty—”

“Thor.” The name rumbled with pure seiðr. The warrior himself held still, awaiting his command. “Make yourself ready,” Loki said, and waited for no reply.

And then, he was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something like a plot begins to emerge. But then there's sex in a barn, and no-one really cares after that. >:D

“But will you not take Sif and Fandral with you?”

“I wish to be alone.” While her unhappiness lodged deep and uncomfortable in his gut, Loki could do little to abate it now. “Mother, I have been sole regent for half a season. Is it so strange that I might like my thoughts – my _world_ – to myself for a scant few days?”

It made her sigh, eyes skipping sideways to the open stretch of garden beyond her opened balcony doors. Loki held his teacup between both hands, its waning heat leeching into cold hands, and yet never seeming to warm them. Though she relented soon enough, turning back to face her son, she did so only in the gently admonishing fashion of a long-practised parent.

“You must be _careful_.”

One corner of his lips turned upward. “Am I ever not?”

“Often.” One hand reached across the space between them, rested heavy upon his left wrist. “Contact me every day.”

“ _Mother_.”

Strangely, she only laughed. “But then, you would even did I not command it of you.” And then, later, when he took his leave of her, she stretched up on her toes so she might press his hair back over one ear. “You are so precious to me, Loki. My son.”

He did so hate to leave her. But then this other rested heavy upon his mind, left his thoughts so often distracted and wandering. Loki had only seen Thor once since their meeting beneath the arena. That had been the morning when those chosen had been scheduled to either go home to tend their affairs, or begin the first round of training with the initial intake. Thor, as one of those due to return home, should not have been there. But when Loki had walked the south arcade of the great central training ground, a lone silhouette stood there motionless, set back from the light. Loki did not raise a hand nor voice in greeting – had not spoken at all, in fact, though he found his feet taking him to his side all the same.

They stood in silence, together, there in the shadows. The urge to touch had wrapped about his heart, his lungs, crushing both to where he barely felt their movement. Loki supposed he could have commanded Thor into some sequestered room, there stripping away the sleeveless leather of his tunic; peeling down the trousers that clung to the curve of his ass, the thick swell of thigh and groin. It would have been all too easy to put him down on his knees, naked, and there ridden him to release.

But he had done none of that. Loki had watched the new recruits at their training, and once when he flicked his eyes sideways to drink in a stolen glance of Thor’s profile, he had discovered the warrior gone. He could not even be angry he had left a king’s presence without permission – not when they hadn’t even had sense enough to speak to one another.

 Riding alone now, he found the solitude both welcome and confining. Neither sensation was any revelation to him. Their immediate relevance also grew dim, now, as he drew near to where the guiding spell gleamed brightest. His horse kept a steady pace as they rode past the village, the rolling fields rich with ripened grain and fruit trees grown heavy with their harvest. Loki had almost reached his destination when he came upon one man at toil amongst them.

The sight he made would have left anyone short of breath: shirtless, the golden skin pulled taut over muscle as he worked. Braided hair gleamed in the bright sunlight. With a faint smile, Loki allowed seiðr to shimmer over his own skin, chasing shadows to change his form. So prepared, Loki pulled his horse to a halt, and merely watched his quarry about his work.

But Thor was a warrior, and instinct told him of his audience soon enough. With the great scythe over one arm, he came close, crossing the field in easy strides. At the fence he rested the tool there, bracing his own arms upon the top as he leaned forward and looked up to him.

“Lady Sif.” The hope of those too-blue eyes made it too easy to almost break character. “Is the king with you?”

Holding his head high – Lady Sif’s natural carriage had always been something he had envied – Loki smiled with borrowed lips, voice light and but faintly amused. “Odin Allfather sits the throne in golden Glaðsheimr.”

“I…” Thor cleared his throat, and Loki fought back laughter at his clear discomfiture. “…Prince Loki, I meant. Is Prince Loki with you?”

He gave a little shrug. “I have come alone.”

It was indeed curious to see how the light flickered away from those once-bright eyes. “Oh.”

The silence grew awkward between them; for all Thor’s natural affability, he had become oddly distant. Loki was not even entirely sure how Sif would herself react to this, and in the end prodded with a too simple, “Are you not glad to see me?”

The smile held a measure of force. “It is a pleasure, Lady Sif,” he said, and even managed a polite little bow. “Is it regarding matters of the Einherjar?”

“In fact, I have come to speak to Lord Gagnráðr,” he said instead, perhaps a tad stiffly; Thor’s own bearing changed again, far too formal for what little Loki knew of him.

“He is at the house. Shall I walk with you there?”

“Directions will suffice.”

Thor gave them easily, made clear with long practice. With a nod Loki thanked him while yet wearing Sif’s lovely face, and then set off. He could feel Thor’s gaze upon his back as he cantered down the narrow road. His own triumph felt hollow enough in comparison to the itching need to lay his fingers upon that skin, to trace the passage of perspiration with his tongue, to close his hand over heated flesh—

Wearing again his skin, Loki still held himself carefully aloof upon reaching the house. A large and rambling manor, it seemed suited to a country lord who owned much of the land spreading out from the house like petals from a flower’s centre. A house-servant greeted him, deferent and knowing; as a stablehand took charge of his mare, the servant guided him into the house and to Lord Gagnráðr’s study.

He was welcomed into the chamber without delay, finding it cool and darkly panelled. The lord of the manor rose from behind a grand desk littered with gleaming tablets, white of hair but very sharp of eye.

“Ah, my prince. Welcome to Þrúðvangr.”

Loki took the offered seat, waved away any offer of refreshment. “It is a lovely area,” he noted, though the great picture window to the west was thickly curtained. Gagnráðr only nodded, his hair tightly braided away from his high features in the fashion of the old Vanir. He was clearly no warrior, for all Loki had heard tell of the exploits of his eldest son; rather, he seemed a scholar fit more for the intricacies of the slippery court at Nóatún. They had that in common, at least. Loki supposed that might even be why they appeared to have taken an instant dislike to one another.

“The land was gifted to my family by your lord father.” He sounded thoughtful now, taking his own seat once more; the dark eyes were sharp, almost birdlike where they raked over the prince’s form. “You have been here before, yes?”

“Never to stay, no.” He smiled, without any true inclination towards it. “But I am told I have passed through.”

“By my youngest son, no doubt.”

From a very young age, Loki had discovered in himself a knack for knowing the subtleties of other’s words. Lord Gagnráðr seemed quite beyond even his skill. The old man knew something Loki did not, and Loki did not appreciate that knowledge in the slightest. “He is an interesting person,” he said, very careful; the old man only nodded, fingers steepled before his chin.

“Have you seen him today?”

“Out in the fields, yes. Does he often do such work?”

“We all do.” One long finger tapped upon the nearest tablet; it seemed quite at odds with the rest of him, given that when he stood his height would barely bring him to Loki’s breastbone. “It is why we choose to live upon the land instead of within the walls of the city. We could leave our work to seiðr and technology, but there is nothing quite like the sensation of dirt between one’s fingers.”

The words prickled over his skin, like curious burrowing insects. “Yes, and then there are others of us far better suited to the high tables and low games of the cities,” Loki said, light as ice. Gagnráðr’s lips downturned.

“His place is here.”

“Are you suggesting he will not take his commission amongst the Einherjar?” It was said more sharply than intended, perhaps. But the old man only shrugged. No frustration, no anger coloured his expression now. Only a weary acceptance, worn about his narrow shoulders like a very old cloak.

“Thor will do as he chooses. It is not my place to dictate his choices.”

“No,” Loki replied, very flat. “It is not.”

“But is it yours?”

The sudden tilting of the old man’s head, the faint mockery of his words, tinged his reply with the bitterness of ash and saltwater. “I will be King of Ásgarðr.”

“Is _Thor_ Ásgarðr?”

Though his mouth opened, no sound emerged. Because the damnable Vanir was right: Thor _was_ Ásgarðr – and so much more so than Loki. Tall, broad, heavily muscled, golden clear skin, bright blue eyes; popular amongst the men, watched doe-eyed by the women. Loki supposed if he’d seen him with children, they’d have climbed him like they would a tree in the garden, perching upon his shoulders while he laughed. And his _power_ : Thor was a warrior constantly on the edge of the berserker, seiðr-storm strong in soul and that great big fool heart.

He stood, his smile as fixed and bloodless as that of a flesh-stripped skull. “I wish to be shown to my chambers.”

“Of course, my prince.”

But Loki did not linger there long. He could not. Changing his clothing to something simple, leather trousers and a soft tunic, he then left the room alone. A wordless servant materialised at his side, but he dismissed them with a wave. This was an unfamiliar house and grounds, but Loki had become accustomed to finding his own pathways since early childhood.

Thor had disappeared from the fields. Loki did not seek him out with any great urgency; he ambled instead, allowing the thoughtless motion to wash away the memory of his meeting with Gagnráðr. A city creature though he might be, he found strange comfort in these lands: the great open plains, with mountains to the north and east, and great hulking forest to the west, the city to the south. All were imbued with a certain kind of tranquillity. Even the air tasted fresher here, almost sharp against his tongue. There would be rain, later. He found he welcomed the thought without regret.

Loki came upon him near a cluster of neat buildings. Still shirtless, hair braided away from his face, Thor clearly had come to the end of his tasks for the day. At his side stood an amiable draft horse, patient while he unhitched its bridle and harness. Once set aside, he then began the process of a thorough rubdown. Only when the horse had been stabled did Loki drift forward, shedding the spell that had shielded him from Thor’s sharp senses.

“He is a fine animal.”

Thor turned so fast, anyone less quick on his feet would have fallen with the momentum of it. The surprise in his eyes made him grin at a jest well-played; the warmth spreading through his veins at the delight in Thor’s eyes felt more troubling. “Sif said you were not here,” he said, but did not ask; Loki could not help but tilt his head, eyes opening just a little too wide with false guile.

“Perhaps Sif was mistaken.”

For a moment, Thor only stared. That warmth low in Loki’s abdomen become an abrupt chill, now, to match the sudden shuttered look in those blue eyes. Then Thor shook his head, lips curled in something that was not quite a smile. “…I cannot believe I fell for that. You move nothing like her.”

“Oh?”

Without another word, Thor returned to his task. Even for Loki’s sharp eye, it was hard to tell if he had taken offense to the lie. But Loki took pleasure enough simply in watching him about his work. The ripple of muscle beneath smooth skin; the memory of digging nails into that firm strength, pressing thighs to waist, hooking ankles at the hollow where the long spine terminated—

“Are you coming back to the house, now?”

Given the deep crease in his brow, Loki suspected it was not the first time Thor had asked. The idea left him only briefly flustered; while Loki might have cursed his distraction under other circumstances, the direction of his thoughts had proved so delicious that he could not. And even with Thor’s obvious wariness, they were so close to fruition, after the long weeks spent so far apart.

Thor rubbed one hand over his beard, narrowed his eyes at the passage of the waning sun. Following his gaze, Loki made his own estimate of the time. “Are you going back to the house, then?” he asked, nonchalant now, and Thor gave a small shrug.

“Dinner will be served soon.”

“How soon?”

He’d calculated well; the low invitation of his words had a noticeable flush beginning at the hollow of his throat, climbing up beneath the bristles of his beard. “I…”

“Could it wait, a moment?”

The wariness of earlier had not yet evaporated, but Thor’s body remained turned to Loki’s, his own voice taking on a hoarser note. “Why, your highness, are you attempting to _seduce_ me?”

A sure hand reached forward, cupped him low. “I believe we are beyond the _attempt_.”

Even as his breath came quicker, he managed faint and genuine laughter. “All right, then. As you wish.” First shaking his head, he then nodded towards the creeping edge of the forest. “Come with me.”

Loki had withdrawn his hand from Thor’s crotch, but a second later found it caught up by one of Thor’s own, fingers tangling together in easy weave. With a tug, Thor pulled him onwards; his palm was hot, damp, somehow welcoming. He should have pulled away, should have broken them apart. Instead he allowed himself to be led away from the main barn and to some place where he had never thought to go.

Nestled amongst of the very beginnings of the treeline, more by regrowth than actual design, sat a smaller building; given the minor dilapidation, Loki could but assume it unused for general work about the estate. Dropping Loki’s hand now, Thor used both of his own to lift up the wooden beam that held the great doors closed. A faint musty scent emerged as the doors cracked open; stepping inside at Thor’s gesture, Loki found the interior cool away from the heat of the sun. He was squinting into the dim surrounds when Thor closed the doors behind them, leaving Loki half-blind in darkness.

There was no time for worry. A hand moved in his once more, a whisper soft against his ear. “Come with me.”

In the dim light, Loki had no sense of age or time or position. They could have been two children, sneaking off for adventure, far from the prying eyes of parents and caregivers. A palm moved to the small of his back, gentled him forward. A ladder emerged from the darkness, the rungs rough and simply hewn beneath searching hands. Thor easily climbed around him, then called him forward. Though his eyes had adjusted somewhat, Loki climbed into the hazy darkness while using no seiðr to call forth any light. Two hands met him at the pinnacle, guiding him over the edge to find straw beneath his knees and palms.

“Wait there, a moment.”

The sloping ceiling cracked open, allowing shafts of sunlight to tumble through to the rough floorboards beneath. The suddenness of it lit him up with brilliant arc, left him golden and grinning.

“Welcome.”

Not without curiosity, Loki peered about the loft of the disused barn. The straw, while not fresh, was certainly not old. A small low table sat near the spill of light, with a small carafe and glasses set upon its scuffed but polished surface. A pallet lay under the eaves, neatly made. A small telescope stood pointed away from the opening of the trapdoor. Even a small stack of books lay at its feet, pages marked here and there with coloured slips of paper. As a whole, it made Loki frown. It might have been a boy’s hiding place once, but it clearly belonged still to the man before him.

“I assume you tumble all the pretty maids up here,” he said, light, not really understanding himself the warning beneath the words. Thor, his own smile crooked, appeared to see far more deeply.

“No.” He’d stooped his head, gently pushing some of the books away from the pallet. “No, this…this is not for that.”

“Oh. I’m disappointed.”

He glanced up, eyes dancing like the golden dustmotes in the sunlight. “ _You_ are not a pretty maid.”

“How kind of you to notice.”

For a long moment neither of said a word. Loki couldn’t imagine why Thor held his silence, but his own reason was simple: it was _Thor_. The damned man had arrested his attention and stolen his speech simply by the action of existing. The way his eyes crinkled, their crescents forming two eclipsed suns; the wide lips, the guile of it nearly child-like, save for the wise warmth of those eyes. And then…and then those damn blue eyes, that couldn’t help but remind him of Frigga.

“I just felt as if we should have met a long time ago.” Loki started, found that Thor had ducked his head again, eyes bowed and hidden from sight as he went on, halting and uncertain. “I realise how ridiculous that sounds. Especially to you – I’m just a warrior from the outlands. Of course I would taste destiny in making the acquaintance of kings.”

Loki’s mouth had turned too dry for the words emblazoned across his mind. _I first tasted destiny on your electric skin, as you rose above me and held me down and made me want forever **.**_

 “I was not lying when I said I saw you that day. I remember so well the seiðr that surrounded you. I could taste it.” The wonder of him actually caused Loki pain; his eyes were wide, dreaming while awake. “It was like…the change of seasons. The first snow of winter, cool and still.”

“Thor.” Shifting from one foot to the next, Loki had to force himself to make the other stop the honeyed words. “There is no need to attempt to seduce me. I came here for this.”

The flinch across his features moved like the result of a blow. “I…” He swallowed hard, turned away; Loki had never wished so hard to have kept his mouth shut. “If that is how you want it, then.”

“ _Thor_.” Loki was not sure of how to say it – or even of _what_ he wished to say. With one hand upon his shoulder, he could feel too well the tremble beneath his palm.

“I know I am not meant for you,” Thor whispered, and in that moment Loki threw all caution to the wind, and surrendered himself to the waiting storm.

Raising his face with two fingers pressed beneath his chin, Loki searched those too-familiar eyes. He said nothing at all – or perhaps, their joint silence said everything that was needed. Stepping carefully back, Loki then drew him down, settled the great body between his thighs as he lay upon the pallet.

The movement of hips came quick, uncertain, almost helpless, their clothed groins pressed painfully close. Keeping their gazes locked, Loki spread his hands upon Thor’s face, held him very still even as his cock hardened further yet. He could not stop moving, even had he wanted to. Thor, entranced though he was, still seemed just a moment away from regret. With a faint smile Loki trailed one hand down his spine and into his trousers, holding tight to the thick muscle of one buttock.

A low groan, pained and uncertain, escaped a tightened throat. Then all reluctance had fled. Lips latched onto his throat, calloused fingers already moving to shed his trousers, made easy in that he had already been barefoot. The great body, fragrant with sweat and the scent of animals and soil pressed impossibly closer. It should have been anathema to one such as him, brought up in the palaces and courts. But Loki only held him closer, cock hard against his leathers, biting into the flesh between throat and shoulder.

The clearing of a throat below knifed through them both. Thor jerked up, twisted his body around so he might face the interruption even as he placed himself between the door and Loki himself. A rectangle of light had opened up low beneath the loft. A single figure stood silhouetted there; Loki recognised him, though only vaguely. It was Thor who spoke his name aloud.

“Hogun.”

No reply came from the man, dark and unmoving in his casual armour. Loki found it difficult to discern the expression of his eyes, given his back was to the light; above, the two of them remained bathed in golden late afternoon sun. As one accustomed to being placed on display, Loki felt no real concern – it was stranger to him that Thor, naked and aroused though he was, showed no shame.

_But then, what has he to feel shame about?_

The bitterness of the thought stung against his mind, but Thor seemed not to notice how Loki had stilled; instead his attention was upon his adoptive brother. “Has Father summoned us?”

Hogun blinked, just once. “No.”

“Then we will return to the house in our own time.”

“I see.”

And it seemed he had seen enough. Turning, Hogun slipped back into the light, and tightly closed the doors behind him. Thor paused but a moment, and then looked to him, eyes searching. Though Loki moved to speak, he did so first – and Thor’s voice remained firm, unyielding – a warrior upon a battlefield.

“I will speak with him. This is beneath your concern – for he will not speak of this to any other, and you do not need to justify yourself to him.” But something in the way Thor’s hands tightened left Loki uneasy, though he did not believe Thor to be lying. As he made to speak, Thor only shook his head, eyes still upon his hands. “He is my brother, my older brother. He only worries for me.” The laugh that followed rang bitter in the dusty air. “Often because I am too much the fool to do so for myself.”

“You are not a fool.”

When he tilted his head, a lone curl of bright hair fell across his eyes. “I hope you are right,” he said ruefully, pushing it back; Loki only raised one arrogant eyebrow.

“I am a king.”

“Not quite yet.” But before Loki’s indignant reply could escape, Thor pressed a light palm over his lips. “But I cannot complain. A king tied to his throne would not be here with me now.”

Loki didn’t have time to protest being silenced by a mere subject, for Thor had dropped his hand almost immediately. But his lips tingled yet; he could not help but trace the tip of his tongue over them, tasting salt and sunshine. “Stay a moment longer,” he whispered, eyes fixed and loaded. “Surely your brother can wait. For just a moment.”

“ _Only_ a moment?” Thor drew close, rested his brow upon Loki’s collarbone, and breathed the words across his throat. “I believe you might underestimate what I had planned for you.”

A faint chuckle was all he could manage, heart lodged up high in his throat. “Come on, then.”

He allowed Thor to undress him, slow and careful and complete. His actions held nothing of the memory of the arena, where he had ripped and torn and left Loki dressed in tatters. This time he moved slow, knowing, mindful of his strength. It ended – or rather, it was set to begin – with Thor on his knees, Loki’s thighs strong about him as he leaned down, and began to press light kisses to his stomach.

Even with the lazy paralysis of rising desire, it was so easy to reach for a jar of salve, taken from a pocket of his coat. Thor had had so little experience with such preparation that his great hands soon turned clumsy and unsure, but with Loki’s low-murmured instructions he soon grew almost confident in his work. Apparently he even took a liking to the taste of the unguent, something sweet and simple; as he worked slick fingers in between loosening muscle, he kept ducking his head to explore further. The thick tongue would move in circles, then up to press curiously against perineum, before then tracing light and curious over the soft skin of his sac.

Loki kept his eyes upon the square of sky above. It seemed very blue, save for the occasional wandering cloud. His hands bunched up in the clean sheets, clenching tight enough to hurt. With Thor’s lips and tongue and fingers between his thighs, he rode a constant wave of arousal, cresting and falling, but never quite reaching breaking point. And only rarely did Thor’s ministrations stray to his cock. He smiled even as he felt strangely like crying.

But now, a change. Between them, Thor sat back, hands now wrapped about Loki’s cock. The clever fingers shifted up and down the shaft; one blunt thumb circled the tip, coaxing forth a pearl of precome, teasing it to a thread. As Loki watched between half-closed lids, Thor leaned forward, gently kissed it away. When he flicked his eyes up, they were nearly black with need.

“Do you think you are ready, now?”

With a lazy roll of hips, Loki chuckled deep in his throat. “I’ve been ready since I saw you in that field.”

A flare of honest desire told Loki all he needed to know about his power over Thor. Before he could even consider the reverse, he was pressed down hard on his back, Thor above and his cock pressed firmly into his hole. Biting his lip, Loki found he couldn’t hold back a cry. Thor echoed it with a low groan. Despite that, Loki still had no clear idea of what drove his next urge. Tangling fingers in the damp hair at the nape of his neck, Loki drew Thor in, and kissed him deep.

At first the whole of him paused mid-thrust, the great body trembling with the effort required to stay so very still. Then came furious return. The motion of pistoning hips remained stuttering and arrhythmic, but it did not seem to matter. Their lips met, drew apart, met again with bruising biting force; Loki found himself drowning in it, in _him_. It left him no air to breathe, and he just didn’t care.

“My neck, kiss my neck.”

The weight of him was incredible, pressing down on him, melding them together, as if Thor intended to climb inside his body and reside there forever. Yet every gasped breath felt somehow _new_ , impossibly rich and clear. Chest to chest now, his hips the only part of him moving, Thor let out a low groan. Loki’s hands moved down, grasped his buttocks hard, feeling their frantic clench where they thrust into him, over and over. The force brought Loki so very close to the threshold of pain, but it was his chest where it hurt most.

One hand rose, and Loki grasped his chin, yanked his face around, pressed their lips together once again. Forcing his tongue through, he tasted bitter sweat and perhaps even blood. Loki kissed him harder, nails raking deep in that perfect golden skin.

But Thor did not stay there. They were both so very close when he pulled out. But he did not stop. Instead, he grasped their cocks between one slick hand, jerking them both; the hard calluses of his warrior hands made Loki’s eyes roll back in his head, nonsense pouring from his lips as they came nearly together. White ropes, tangled and hot, spread over his stomach, and Loki drew him down for another kiss that went on until they both gasped for air.

Even now Thor did not lift his weight. Loki could not complain. Struggling for breath even as he did, he allowed that great head to rest upon his breast, fingers tangling in the damp strings of his hair. Staring into the blue sky, Loki saw little, felt only the heat of him. Then, again he rose. Lips moved against his own without invitation. The exhaustion of him was palpable, but the desperation drove harder, faster. So tightly Thor held to him, mouth pressed to the pulse of his throat as he sighed upon that single whisper.

“ _Loki_.”

But even as the name spilled from his lips, honest and aching, Loki’s post-coital relaxation stiffened into shock, mind whiting out for all the wrong reasons. And then when he glanced up, Thor’s sudden horror knifed into him, hot and hard.

“I’m sorry, my prince, I did not mean—”

It could only be a mistake, to halt him with a further kiss, wrapping arms and legs about him, dragging him back into his own bed. But Loki didn’t care. He wouldn’t let himself. Not now, at least. Already he could feel him hardening again, even as his own hips tilted upward, thighs falling open in frantic welcome.

No, there would be time for regret later. For now, Loki pushed all thought aside in favour of desire, and reached once more for that glorious cock.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, so it's to be the _country_ life for the both of them...
> 
> And I have to link here [this particularly gorgeous art](http://schaudwenart.tumblr.com/post/145024062987/lokisergi-you-cant-he-said-at-last-hoarse) by Schaudwen, because hot damn. HOT. DAMN.

In the rest of the day that followed, Loki traipsed all over the great estate in the company of Thor’s foster-father and brother. Despite having a more than decent understanding of Ásgarðr and her exports and trade, Loki had no particular interest in seeing anything of how Þrúðvangr actually operated. But he also knew there had to be some excuse for his presence there.

_Other than the fact I just wanted to fuck your son, and be fucked in return._

The most recent encounter with said son had left him with some residual and faint discomfort. Healing seiðr had never been his particular speciality, though Loki had learned more than enough to heal even such… _intimate_ …damage. But he found it more amusing to sit upon the horse and his tooled leather saddle, feeling the thrust of pain with every rise and fall of his hips, with every jolt of the creature’s cantering motion. If he were not careful, he would be limping every step between stable and house.

He rather liked the idea.

But he kept his dignity intact, if only for the watchful gaze of Thor’s foster father upon him. As they returned to the house, Loki handed the reins of his mount to the stablehand, and turned to bestow a low nod upon the lord. He bowed low in return, rose with dark eyes almost too bold upon him.

“It has been an honour, my prince.”

“Of course,” Loki offered, his own smile as false as the genteel words of Lord Gagnráðr. But then, such falsities were the bedrock upon which the court had been built for generations. “I shall see you at dinner, then.”

He could not be bothered feigning any surprise to find Thor lounging against the wall just down the hall from his chambers. With a quirked half-smile Loki sailed past, reaching to pull the door closed behind him. And he turned back only to bathe in the glory that was the consternation upon those broad features. It might have been amusing to close said door, to leave Thor to stew in what was clearly the rare experience of rejection. But his own traitorous desire had him raising an eyebrow, tilting his hips as he raked his eyes up and down Thor’s lovely form.

“Do you wish to do something for me, Thor?”

His own smile was a small, uncertain thing. “What would you have of me?”

Narrowing his eyes, Loki tapped a long finger against pursed lips. “I must bathe before dinner,” he mused. “Come be my maid.”

Of course they did not make it to actual bathing: it only went as far as both stripping away their clothes, and then they were upon the bed in a tangle of limbs and lips. Loki counted it another mistake, just one more to add to the ever-growing catalogue they were generating between them. But this was not his own bed, at least. He was but a guest in this house. And one fucking their youngest son, at that.

It was near impossible to be sure, but perhaps it was the fault of the long afternoon sun – it streamed in the windows, leaving him languid, indulgent, almost whimsical in his mood. With all muscles worked to utter relaxation, Loki lay on one side amongst tumbled sheets, fingers walking lazy circles upon the thighs of his companion.

Eyes still closed, Thor gave a low rumbling breath, like some great cat soothed to sleep after successful hunt and feast. Lips curving, Loki allowed his fingertips to trace upward, slow and teasing and true.

“You have a very beautiful cock,” he mused, thumb just rubbing over its head; Thor started, cracked open one eye in a gesture both startled and amused.

“Why, thank you.”

“Yes,” Loki hummed softly, more to himself than Thor. “Very pretty indeed.”

His lips had barely closed over the tip when Thor pushed himself to his elbows, very much wide awake now. Unable to help his grin, Loki looked up, one eyebrow cocked. He didn’t speak. He just swallowed, once – slow, deliberate. The blue of Thor’s eyes was already vanishing under the onslaught of his dilating pupils.

“You can’t,” he said at last, hoarse, strangely accented. “It’s not…you should not…you are my _king_ , you cannot…”

And Loki only laughed, bowed his head, let the long strands of his hair flicker feather-light over the quickening motion of his abdomen. “Oh, Thor,” he said, and gentled a tongue along the shaft. “I believe you will find I can do _whatever I like_.”

They both were very late to dinner.

 

*****

 

He found her in the gardens, basket over one hand, long fingers sorting through the petals and leaves of a bushy shrub before her. Though she made no motion, no acknowledgement, he wasn’t fool enough to believe she did not feel his presence. Crossing to her side, he leaned forward, scented the earthy fragrance of the flowers. Then he turned to her, found her regarding him with a raised eyebrow.

“Hello, Mother.”

“Loki.” But despite the easiness of her smile, he could not help but see it faded as she returned her attention to the flowers, fingers quick and deft as she selected the blooms she required. “You have been in Þrúðvangr, I understand,” she said, soft, and he frowned.

“Yes.” And said frown deepened when he moved to help her, only to have his hand gently pushed back and away. “Is that a problem?”

Frigga moved further down the line, head still bent to her work. “It simply seems…strange.”

“Does it bother you?”

The unintended harshness of the words stilled Loki himself; even as he wished to pluck the words from the air, taking them back and tucking them away in some dark place Frigga need not even know existed, she turned to him with a sigh. Her hands were very tight over the handle of her basket.

“I had not realised the depth of your…interest.”

“Have you met Thor?”

He could not miss the slight shudder that the name alone sent through her: an invocation of some power Loki did not understand, had not even known existed. And Loki so very rarely felt the cold, though in that moment his skin rippled with gooseflesh, strange and shivering.

Then, she moved past him, head held high. “I have not met the man,” she said, very simple. Swallowing hard, Loki moved to join her, found even his long legs struggling to keep up with her pace.

“Would you like to?”

“No.”

It had always been so very rare for him and Frigga to disagree on any matter. She had always been aware of his dalliances, had rarely seemed bothered by the nature of them – only cautioning the level of discretion that would be expected from those of their status.

_And she has not even met him_.

“Mother,” he said, and started to hear how small his own voice had abruptly become. “He’s very interesting to me. And not simply as a warm body.”

By now, she had reached one of the many small and spindly benches scattered about the garden; abandoning her basket to the path, she took a heavy seat. And then, she looked up to him, blue eyes sorrowful and said.

“Loki,” she said, with all the grief of a mother who could not bear to see a child suffer, “You must realise you cannot keep him.”

Rearing back, he could not help but clench his hands to fists. Only by the application of great will could he soften them again, his tone falsely easy even as his heart beat in troubled rhythm in a suddenly aching chest. “Excuse me?”

Again she sighed, one long-fingered hand upon the place by her side. “He will return to Þrúðvangr.”

Careful, slow, Loki sat there at her side, but found he could not look to her. “At the word of the queen?”

For a long moment no words passed between them. The gardens, always beautiful, seemed more so at this hour: the liminal drift between day and night, when all barriers dropped low and anything might become possible. “No,” she said, very soft; when she looked upward, Loki could see the shadows of stars in her eyes even though they had not risen yet. “No, I will not become involved.” And then she looked down, to the hands tangled in her lap. “But he cannot stay here.”

He spoke through numb lips; lips that smiled, even when it was as false as the calm of his words. “At this stage, it seems very much that he will.” And his eyes moved forward, fixed upon the basket of harvested flowers. Beautiful now, they would soon wither and die away from their point of origin. But then, as seiðmaðr, he’d always thought he’d understood why it had to be thus.

“Is it because he is berserker?” he asked, sudden. And Frigga shook her head, the silver chains woven into her hair lightly chiming in the burgeoning twilight.

“No berserker has ever held service in the Einherjar.”

“I could teach him control.”

“Loki.” One hand reached between them, curled too tight about his own. “You cannot.”

He could feel the bruises already blossoming there. But he did not withdraw. “Are you going to stop me?”

“No.” And she let him go, closed her eyes as she drew a deep and troubled breath. “It is his own choice. And I believe he will soon enough decide that his place is in the country.”

When he looked to her now, it was as if he saw a stranger. This was not the queen before her beloved people; this was not his mother before her only son. This was a weary woman, bowed of head and of spirit, uncertain where before she had always been so blessed by the will of the Norns themselves.

“What do you have against a person you have never even met?” he whispered. And she shook her head, looked up with a smile as faint as the tears sheening her eyes.

“Loki.” She bit her lip, nodded, just once. “He is a good soul. I know this.”

“Then why won’t you let me keep him?”

Now her hands curled about her arms as she looked away, as if her own embrace were the only thing that might keep her from flying all to pieces. “It would not be in the best interests of you both,” she whispered.

Fear wound an uneasy hand about his heart. Only anger could stop it from choking him to silence. “Well,” he said, and he was standing though he did not remember taking to his feet. “If we cannot discuss this like adults, then I shall take my leave.”

“Loki.” When she looked up to him now, there was only weariness in her words. “You are acting like a child.”

“And you are treating me like one!”

And she rose, lovely and pale in her silvered gown. Her hands were cold around his, pale as ice and nearly as translucent. “I do not wish us to part in anger,” she said, very soft. The fury drained from him as an undammed river, but his heart still ached as though she’d reached between his ribs, as though she’d crushed it between her long fingers.

“Mother.” Words came so easily to his silvered tongue; now, they tangled in a clumsy ruin. “Mother, he…he _interests_ me. Not just…physically. There’s something inside of him. It calls to me.” His throat grew tight, his tongue tasting of bitter salt. “I want to know more of it.”

Her hand tightened. “We spoke of this when you were a child,” she said, and for all the gentleness of her voice he could sense the iron beneath it. “The call of seiðr beyond your control.” And her eyes locked onto his, did not allow him to look away. “I cannot force you to end this, Loki,” she said, the eternal queen to her subject. “But I can ask you to consider my wishes.”

But even here, even now – the memory of him burned deep. Smiling lips pressed against his. The heat of him, both inside and out.

Loki carefully took his hand from Frigga’s. “I need time to think about it.”

She bowed her head, turned away. “I will always be here for you, Loki.”

The scent of the flowers lingered on his skin long after he left her.

 

*****

 

The new recruits were some time into initiation and orientation when Loki requested Thor. The captain had appeared somewhat perplexed; while the royal guardsman were selected from within their ranks, it was not usually done so early, with so much basic training yet to be accomplished.

Knowing all that, Loki still smiled with all his teeth to see his clear unease. “Are you going to deny your prince’s request?” he asked, light and lovely. The man grimaced, but to his credit did not look away.

“Of course I will not, I simply…” And now the man did look away, though Loki sensed no rudeness in the gesture; rather, his attention had simply shifted, drawn to Thor himself like iron to lodestone. “…he is a strange one.”

Loki followed his gaze, easily found Thor below them. Even amongst a battalion of his peers, most of them blond and well-built, he stood out. But Loki knew the captain’s unease came from something far darker than Thor’s simple beauty, his undeniable brawn. The rumours of his berserker status swarmed about the palace and the city both, and not a one of them could truly be denied. Loki himself remained troubled by his own odd conversation with Frigga some days ago; time had only made it stranger, ephemeral in its memory. She’d never spoken of it again.

“I simply wish to keep an eye on his progress,” Loki said, easy and simple. And the captain only bowed his head before his prince. He was Loki, after all: seiðmaðr and warrior both, son of the greatest king to wield both strengths.

“I shall send him to you this afternoon, during the break in training.”

An Einherjar always remained true to his word. Thor found Loki at the appointed hour in a training hall he’d reserved for privacy; dressed in a light training tunic and trousers, barefoot with hair scraped back in loose braids, he resembled something close to a puppy: excitable and bright. He calmed but slightly when he saw Loki was not alone.

“Your highness.”

It twisted his abdomen in all the most inappropriate ways, to see that golden head bowed low before him. “Thor,” he acknowledged, and then as he rose again to full height, “This is Volstagg.”

The two clasped hands, the easy strength of warriors born and trained apparent in them both as they held the gesture just a moment too long. Volstagg had already privately expressed concern over the incident in the arena, but already Loki could see the relaxed tilt of broad shoulders, a genuine grin breaking a sunny smile across ruddy features. He would have rolled his eyes, striking out with some silver-barbed insult, had it not been more convenient this way.

But even as Loki indulged in but a moment of casual daydream, already the two had fallen to easy rapid conversation. Volstagg’s family had an estate out somewhere near Þrúðvangr, and apparently it was a small world indeed in that particular direction. Loki permitted it for perhaps a moment, and then snorted; both turned to him, startled and silenced.

“Volstagg.” Loki smiled, lovely and wide. “If you wish to gossip like an old maid, you can do it in a tavern out of hours.”

“I – of course, highness.” But he’d become almost immune to Loki’s silvered tongue a long time ago; Volstagg’s grin hardly faded as he slapped Thor on the back. Despite the fact Loki would have believed Thor the stronger of the two, he rocked forward from the force and might have fallen had Volstagg not put a hand out to steady him. “I’ll have to have the boy for dinner. Several times. Hilde will put some weight on those poor bones!”

Thor gave him a sideways glance, lips pressed together and then pushed out in something like bewilderment. “I…didn’t realise I needed it.”

And Volstagg laced his hands over his own generous girth, even as it resonated with hearty laughter. “Oh, my boy. You _do_.”

“He’s fine as he is, Volstagg.”

The raised eyebrow Volstagg sent his way suggested he knew _exactly_ how Loki preferred Thor to be. “Well, you would say so,” he said, and the cursed man actually _winked_. Before Loki could eviscerate him with a scowl alone, Volstagg returned his attention to Thor, eyes twinkling and crinkled by his grin. “So, has our Loki told you why he wished us to meet? Or did he not tell you anything at all?” Though he leaned close, all pretence of subterfuge was quite ruined by the natural volume of his voice – and the fact he stared directly at Loki as he said every word. “If you’re to be on his staff, you must become accustomed to a bit of cloak and dagger, I’m afraid. He’s terribly obtuse about his machinations, most of the time.”

“ _Volstagg_.”

“Just telling the boy the way it is.” And of course he was unperturbed where others might had turned tail and run, fearing the retribution of a furious Loki. In fact, he could see from Thor’s wide eyes and faint bemused grin that Volstagg’s easy tone with his prince was a source of immediate amazement. But Loki recalled the way he had whispered his name, in the barn, and looked away.

“It is simple enough,” he said, eyes upon the nearest weapons rack, “why I have brought you together.”

“You have met Sif, and Fandral?”

Loki glanced up to find Thor regarding Volstagg with a frown. “Lady Sif, yes. The other, I do not think so.”

With a snort, Loki waved away any further question as to his companions. “At this stage I have no intention of letting Fandral pant all over him,” he told the elder of the two, and before Volstagg could say anything unfortunate, turned immediately to Thor. “Volstagg has skills I would have him pass onto you.”

Even without glancing over, he could tell Volstagg beamed fit to shame the sun herself. “Such high praise, Loki!”

Most of the time it was simply easier to just ignore him. “Volstagg’s family has served the royal family for generations,” Loki told Thor, hands loosely laced before his hips. “He was one of my teachers when I was an adolescent – and though my preferred fighting style developed into one quite different to his, there were things I learned from him that no other teacher could demonstrate…quite the way he could.”

Volstagg’s laughter quite rebounded from every wall of the training salle. “But then Loki was always a very unique student, shall we say?”

While Thor looked as though he wouldn’t disagree with such a statement, he kept his words cautiously diplomatic. “I look forward to what he might teach me.” And then be blinked up at Loki, suddenly deeply uncertain. “That is why I am here, yes?”

“To a degree.” One hand reached out, fingers tracing over the hilt of a training saber; he frowned, glanced sideways at Thor. “As part of my training with Volstagg, he agreed to allow me to…experiment, with him.”

The golden brows furrowed tightly together. “Pardon?”

The laughter escaped from him in a loud, helpless bark; even as Thor started, Loki only laughed harder. It almost hurt; while they called him a trickster, he rarely indulged like this in casual humour. And yet, he could not help himself. While he had no great affection for the idea of being either over or under Volstagg, Loki he did not need to be a mindreader to imagine the images going through Thor’s mind.

And the pinkened flush of Thor’s stubbled cheeks only put him in far greater a humour. “Volstagg has very little ability with seiðr,” Loki offered as his hilarity calmed enough to allow for speech; flicking his eyes sideways, he added with a mocking grin, “About what you would expect from a typical Asgardian warrior, in fact.”

Again, those hands curved over his great belly, mouth twisted in an actual pout. “ _Typical_ , highness?”

“Be quiet.”

“You don’t pay me to be quiet.”

Again, it was far easier to just ignore him, and his idiot grin. “Now, I don’t believe you are of that particular class at all – you have a great deal of elemental seiðr within you, and once mastered, it would be a considerable strength to you.”

While some part of Thor clearly wished to preen under such praise, it was clear that he had intelligence enough to realise it was a gift rather than some achievement he’d earned. “Like yours, you mean?”

“No, not like mine.” Folding his arms, Loki tilted his head, gave Thor a critical look that for once had little to do with carnal urge. “What I know, is…vaster. More diverse. It is an inbred talent, though it is also one that requires early nurturing and development.”

Thor’s eyes, the rich deep blue of a charged sky, flickered upward. “My…elemental power. Is it too late?”

“No.” And when Thor fixed his gaze upon him again, he smiled with all of his teeth. “I would not be wasting my time, otherwise.” Now Loki began to strip away his outer layers, though in a manner more efficient than titillating. “But in this, at least, you have something in common with Volstagg,” he said, and reached for a staff. “I tried to teach him basic seiðr while he taught me his way of combat.”

Startled, Thor managed to drag his gaze away from Loki long enough to look to the other man; Volstagg’s shrug was an overlarge and easy thing. “Loki is a very good teacher.”

Such confession was not something to be expected of a warrior. Thor frowned deeper, but was clearly intrigued; it seemed his Vanir foster family and country upbringing had done him good, in this at least. “Did you learn much?”

Loki, by now idly spinning the staff from one hand to the next, snorted. “The only spell he ever mastered was duplication.”

“That sounds very complex.”

Even as Volstagg grinned at Thor’s diplomacy, Loki rolled his eyes, spun the staff to a stop. “It is.” Setting it aside, he reached instead for a halberd. “He only uses it for food.”

“But I never learned substantiation,” Volstagg added, mobile features downturned in sudden deep mourning. “I still have an empty belly at the end of it.”

A surprised, very genuine laugh escaped Thor at that. Volstagg gave him a conspirator’s grin, one meaty hand upon his shoulder again.

“Fortunately, my wife is very good with cooking – not as good as I, perhaps, but together we feast. You really must come to dinner.”

“So you keep saying,” Loki replied in Thor’s place, very dry. “But for the moment, Volstagg: demonstrate some of your more _pragmatic_ skills for Thor.” And then, to the man himself: “Should you join my staff, then Volstagg will be your commander.”

“Not the Lady Sif?”

The strange uncertainty of that prickled along Loki’s skin; jealousy had never suited him well. “Her duties are somewhat broader,” he said, very much sharper than intended, knuckles whitened where his hands wrapped tight about the halberd’s shaft. “Volstagg is the one who stays closest to me.”

“Unless there are women and wine in close proximity,” the man himself said, rolling his eyes. “Then, it is all but impossible to drag Fandral from your side.” Then, glancing about, “Where _is_ Fandral? I have not seen him this morning.”

“Neither have I, and I am hardly lacking for it.” Setting the halberd aside once more, Loki took a bundle from his side, spread it out on the bench just behind him. When he was seated there, his daggers and cleaning implements laid out in orderly lines, he nodded to them both once last time. “You may begin.”

There was little intrigue in a shirtless Volstagg, but Loki could hardly deny the simple pleasure of Thor stripped to the waist, chest heaving, drenched in sweat. Despite his considerable strength, Volstagg’s own power and experience proved challenge enough for him. And he was an eager, engaged student; as he observed the bout around the cleaning of blades and hilts, Loki could see Volstagg was impressed, going further than either Loki or Volstagg himself might have expected from a simple introductory lesson.

The two of them were quite drenched in sweat when Loki at last finished attending to the care of his daggers; standing, he waved a hand, brought the latest bout to an early end. “That will do, for now.”

Still breathing hard, though hardly laboured, Volstagg reached out to Thor; the two grasped forearms again, this time with a casual ease that echoed their matched grins. “You fought to bring pride to your ancestors,” he said, as easy and generous as his rotund body. “The bathing chambers, then?”

But Loki had glided forward before Thor could even think to answer. “You can go on ahead,” he said, and light as the words were, they brooked no argument. “I wish to speak with Thor for a moment.”

As Volstagg gave a low bow – only half-mocking, at that – Loki turned, returned to the bench where his daggers had been laid out. Only when they had been tidied away in the leather roll did he pat the place beside him; Thor took it after a moment’s brief hesitation, still damp and musky with sweat. It was hardly Loki’s favourite scent. But he breathed deep, all the same: found it alive and vibrant and strong.

“Give me your hand.”

Thor did so without question. When Loki glanced up, he almost wished it otherwise; Thor appeared to him too trusting, perhaps. Even now, as he searched those blue eyes with his own, he sensed nothing but curiosity, and simple true affection.

“Make something for me.”

The sudden words had Thor quirking both an eyebrow, and a smile. “Like what?”

“Light.” Loki could have done it himself, and with scarcely a thought at that. And yet the very thought it now curled low in his abdomen, excitement and arousal both as he repeated, “Call lightning to your hand.”

And yet, for all the clear concentration upon Thor’s broad features, the air there remained still, quiescent. With a sigh, he withdrew his hand from Loki’s own. Then he tangled them together in his lap, head drooping forward like a chastised hound.

“I am very tired,” he offered, in a voice too small for the throat and chest it came from. Loki gave a light snort, stretched his legs out before him.

“Strangely, that worked well for Volstagg. His body seemed more inclined to override his inbred reservations when he was exhausted, and perhaps unable to otherwise defend himself as well as he might physically.” Thor chanced a look upward then, and Loki narrowed his eyes, just a little. “So you have never been taught seiðr at all, then?”

“No.” Taking a deep breath, his shoulders rose, then fell again. “Even with my family having been Vanir, they…it was not considered appropriate, I suppose.”

Pursing his lips, Loki looked ahead, across the salle. The long light of late afternoon cut through the columns, translucent bloodless blades upon the air. “Strange,” he murmured, and Thor shook his head, slow and uncertain.

“Perhaps they hoped not doing so would keep the berserker quiet.”

“It would be a fool’s errand to believe so.” Angling himself towards Thor, he took his chin, tilted it upward so that Thor had nowhere else to look but to him. “I will see what I can find out, about this.”

Thor blinked, just once. “So you are to be my teacher.”

“No.” Loki’s smile curled across his lips, eyes hooded and deep. “You have much to learn amongst the Einherjar. And I do not have the patience – I am a poor teacher, Thor.” Leaning close, now, he breathed the words against his skin. “But I wish to explore it.”

Thor shivered beneath his touch. “How?”

Releasing his fingers, Loki raised his hand, pressed the length of it along the damp skin of Thor’s face. “You will enter my personal bodyguard, in time. That has already been decided.” And, careful and reverent, he pressed aside the memory of Frigga’s concern. “I shall monitor your training, and discover more of your abilities and how they might be harnessed.” Stroking, now, Loki leaned so close that the words were whispered against his lips. “It will be easier, if I can see you. From time to time.”

Thor’s hands tightened on the bench at his side. “I am at your disposal,” he said, and the blue eyes were wide blue sky where he looked at Loki alone. “My king.”

“Not yet.”

“You will always be my king.”

The kiss hadn’t been quite intended – and still it happened, Loki’s hands around his face. At a whisper, Thor’s hands were upon him even as Loki leaned back, pulling him down, slotting that great bulk of him between his spread thighs. Everything about this was such a damnable mistake.

He made it twice more before returning Thor to his barracks.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, dear. There appears to be a plot.
> 
> Also, @schaudwen did [the sweetest piece of art](http://lokisergi.tumblr.com/post/145763714997/the-king-and-i-ch-6-by-claricechiarasorcha-i) to match this chapter. THESE STUPID BOYS, I DON'T KNOW

Odin’s personal receiving room had never been a place where Loki had found much peace, or comfort. Inside its darkly panelled walls, Odin was forever King and Loki but his subject, even more so than within the great throne room itself. It grew only all the more oppressive, the air thickened and tasting faintly of ozone, when Odin at last looked up from his desk to acknowledge his son standing silent before him.

“Loki.” Long, age-worn fingers twitched slightly upon the great polished oak, stilled again; his left hand remained tight about the stylus upon the empty second page. “I have a task for you.”

Tilting his chin upward, hands folded neatly at the small of his back, Loki allowed himself a tight smile. “Of course I will do my utmost to fulfil your requirements of me, Father.”

A strange look crossed his features then – the way shadows moved across a silent moon, fleeting and strange and frightening. Even as Loki’s brow furrowed, his skin prickling with sudden cold gooseflesh, Odin’s singular eye dipped back down to his work, the neat calligraphy of a well-practised hand.

“You are to go to Jötunheimr.”

“ _Jötunheimr_?”

Odin did not glance up, for all Loki’s surprise ricocheted about the room with a lack of elegance utterly alien to one of his oratorical skill. “It is…a diplomatic matter.” This time when he looked up, the quill – crafted of a tail feather shed by one of his familiars – was set aside, Odin’s considerable focus set upon Loki alone. “The king wishes to meet you.”

“I – why?”

And he felt such a fool, standing before Odin with his mouth hanging open, silver tongue quite stripped of its usual élan. But Odin’s face, its deep lines and wrinkles but a mirror of the gnarl and twist of an aging ash tree, appeared only tired. “Because you will be king upon Ásgarðr’s throne soon enough.” Leaning back now in his throne-like chair, Odin allowed himself at last a single sigh. “And while the terms of our treaty do not permit much travel or trade between our realms, Laufey is of long-lived stock. It is better that you should know him.” And then, a light Loki did not care overly to consider entered his eye, the white head tilting in a manner more critical than curious. “Perhaps you will wish to change the status quo, once you know more of the king and his realm.”

Loki swallowed, found his throat still dry and tight. When at last he found voice enough to speak, it came higher than its usual wont. “When am I to go?”

“In a few days.”

“A few _days_?”

For the first time Odin smiled – a weary gesture, one more suited to an old man about his will-making than a king securing his legacy. “Yes,” he said, and he stood from his desk; Loki could not help but note the slow way he found his balance, took his first steps as he skirted around to come to Loki’s side. “You will take only Sif, Volstagg, Fandral, and an accompaniment of seasoned Einherjar.”

Again he swallowed, struggled to find words. Sometimes he forgot, that Odin stood so much shorter than he himself did. “I see.”

And now Odin squinted up at him, his voice suddenly sharp. “You will be perfectly safe in Laufey-king’s household. He would wish no harm to come to you, in his home.”

Again, the crawling sensation bloomed along his skin: as if he’d touched something very cold, something alive and breathing – and all too capable of biting. “I’m not…that isn’t what concerns me.”

“So what _does_ concern you?”

Loki had had no answer for his father then. And he had no further answer now, with Thor looking up from his work at the weapons rack. Keeping curious eyes away from them with a perception cantrip had proved easy enough, the minor spell causing people to look elsewhere whenever their eyes drifted over the two of them. But even those not typically sensitive to the weave of seiðr would notice it if Loki kept it up. Especially as his own rising agitation made it difficult to concentrate, to keep his magic in perfect resonant configuration about them both.

But Loki had not been able to wait to tell him. He had all but run to Thor, summoning him from his practice, dragging him into the shadows of the training yard to tell him of his assigned mission.

And even in the gloom Thor’s eyes were a bright and brilliant blue, excitement all but pouring from him in waves. Loki could taste such energy upon his skin, all lightning-flash and mineral rain.

“Can I come with you?”

And it hurt, to watch such enthusiasm flicker and die as he shook his head. “No.” And, before Thor could think to challenge what he could never defeat: “Father made it clear that only experienced Einherjar would be permitted on a diplomatic mission of this nature. You are barely commissioned.”

Thor gave no answer but silence, his hands returning to motion as he turned away. But even as he began to rearrange the weapons upon their racks, callused hands both careful and quick about a task he knew so well, Loki could sense no annoyance, no anger.

There was only deep concern in every word when Thor said, in something dreadfully close to a whisper, “I don’t want you to go.”

Loki allowed his amusement to shine strongest, though even he could not mask that it was underlain with faint discomfort. Not in the face of Thor’s shadowed features, the hunch of his bare broad shoulders. “It is hardly your choice.”

For the first time, Loki felt the prick Thor’s rising, roiling irritation. “I _realise_ that.”

“Do you not believe I can keep myself safe?”

And Thor’s great hands tightened, knuckles whitening even under the deep tan of his weathered skin. “I _know_ you can.” And then, after a long moment, his fingers relaxed from fists, though still Thor did not look up. His voice proved barely audible amongst the shouts and clanging of weapons from the yard behind them both.

“But I should be with you.”

Loki sighed, glanced down to his own hands: very pale against the black of his leathers, deceptively elegant where they had been the harbingers of much pain and damage, in their own time. “Thor.” And when he did not look up, he sharpened the tone to a clear point. “ _Thor_.”

“I know I am but one soldier amongst many.” And still he did not look up, though he remained very still, eyes fixed upon the vast array of weapons before him. “But it is my dearest wish.”

Loki’s lips had thinned, but he did not lay hands upon him, no matter how he wished to see into those hooded eyes. “To serve?” he asked, and Thor only sighed.

“To be yours.”

It had been a mistake to come here, indeed. Crossing his arms over his chest, his heart a rabbit-quick beat deep within the shell of armoured leather, Loki allowed his own gaze to drift out over the training yards. This conversation could not continue. And perhaps Frigga had been right; Thor ought never to have come to Glaðsheimr.

And yet, he was not walking away from him.

“It is not to be a long trip,” he said, eventually. Thor only curled in closer over himself, one hand gentle along the line of a halberd.

“I will think of you every moment.”

Arching an eyebrow, Loki allowed his voice to fall to cold warning chill. But he knew his eyes told no lie. “Do you not already?”

Now he turned, a lopsided smile upon those beloved features. Forced now himself to look away, Loki felt rather than saw Thor’s face fall, his voice turning to halting uncertainty.

“I know you think me foolish,” he began, and halted at Loki’s sudden, stilting laugh.

“Perhaps I have a weakness for fools.”

His voice had been pitched so low, he’d half-hoped Thor would not have heard. But his warmth drew close, sunlight moving in dawn crawl over dewy fields, and Loki sighed. “You have no weaknesses,” Thor said, low whisper into his ear, chin light upon the tense line of a shoulder. “You cut them out whenever you see them. Excise them. Make yourself perfect.”

Wordless, forcing his spine to rigid straightness, Loki stepped forward and away from the dreadful wonderful heat of Thor’s welcoming body. “I have matters to attend to.”

“I will be here. Waiting for you.”

Stepping close was always a risk, but his heart beat too fast, a high flush upon his cheeks. “The only other place I would have you,” Loki murmured, foolish and unspeakably merry, “is under me. Or on my cock.”

Thor’s resulting laughter was something Loki caught up in a kiss too violent to be called fond. Or so he told himself, turning before he could even think to look back.

He still did. And Thor raised a hand in farewell, still and golden and perfect in the gleaming beauty of Ásgarðr’s beating heart.

 

*****

 

Leaving Ásgarðr had been a strange wrench; a wanderer by nature, Loki had never been one to dawdle over the act of leaving his homeland, maudlin for what he knew would always be waiting for him upon his return. Perhaps it had been the strange watchfulness of Heimdall that had unsettled him so. While the gatekeeper had bowed his head to the crown prince with the usual prescribed deference, perfect and poised, Loki had still felt that golden regard as a cool touch upon his own flushed skin. Loki had never quite trusted him. He suspected it was because Heimdall had likely never trusted Loki at all.

The Bifröst deposited them upon a cliff face some distance from the great castle-city of Útgarðr. A waiting entourage fanned out before them, small in number but strong in arms and appearance. Their envoy proved to be a hulking giant who introduced himself in low rumble as Helblindi, crown prince and heir to Jötunheimr’s throne. His hand was very large about Loki’s gloved one; its grip, true but not crushing. The red eyes, bright against the sallow scarified skin, were both searching and curious as Loki met them without fear. From even such a creature Loki took no sense of menace despite his sheer bulk, and the unspoken power of both muscle and ice beneath his bared skin.

“You are welcome here, Loki-prince.”

And he bowed his head, knowing the snowflakes in his dark hair would give him the appearance of a prince fallen from the darkest skies. “I thank you, Prince Helblindi.”

The strange topography of the place grew no more uniform as they began the descent into the alley. A perpetual dusk painted the landscape in shades of midnight blue and grey; apparently they had come in the dark season, and Jötunheimr would not see its low sun again for some months. Though he had been educated somewhat on Jötunheimr as a child, no detail had permeated any of those lessons; everything granted by his tutors had been but simple and vague. Given the lack of seiðr inherent to the realm, especially since the removal of the Casket of Ancient Winters, Loki had had little motivation to seek out any information for his own interest.

Odin’s sudden announcement had given him little time to remedy his ignorance. Jötunheimr had always, to Ásgarðr, been a world best left to history; Loki could find precious enough writings upon the subject, even in the palace’s great and varied library.

But as he moved through its landscapes now, he could see that the realm was very much alive, if not precisely vibrant. The beating heart of their people had been caught long ago within the Casket of Ancient Winters: the true heart of Ymir, if rumour was to be believed. With it gone, the realm could not be as it was then. The Casket’s power had been fettered through the combined seiðr of the Asgardian king and queen, Odin and Frigga tempering its strength so the people of Jötunheimr might live, but not marshal the same strength as they once had.

But Jötunheimr went on, and as Loki moved deeper he could not deny the odd, faded beauty laid out before him. He still could not help but cast a suspicious look to the serac field as they walked further down the ice road cut through its centre. The murmuring of the ice swirled about them with every step forward. The Jötnar seemed unconcerned, though every alien whisper and chuckle from the towering columns seemed to speak of death but a moment away. The frost giants had an intrinsic connection to their land. Perhaps they would know: before icefall, before avalanche.

But Loki could not entirely certain they would do him the courtesy of sharing such knowledge.

Yet, for all he would never be naïve enough to believe that so many years could have passed without some faction chafing at the bit that Ásgarðr had muzzled them with, Loki had no sense of immediate danger. He almost enjoyed the cool bite of the air upon what little skin he allowed to be exposed to it. It had a strange taste upon his tongue, of wintergreen and thin bitter oxygen. And when he glanced up into the jagged thrust of the mountains that ringed their position, he wondered what the air would be like at such dizzying pinnacle.

The castle came into view not long later: while not as grand as that at Glaðsheimr, it proved the more magnificent in that it emerged from the land itself. Half rock, half ice: as they moved into the grand halls of volcanic black and cool blue-white, Loki could not help but marvel at the stark beauty of its construction. And yet as the great doors closed, the ambient temperature seemed comfortable enough that Loki felt in no danger of hypothermia. When he made a pointed remark to that fact, it only made Helblindi chuckle.

“You are not the first Asgardian who has stayed here.”

Loki, at the head of his small group with his three warriors ranged silent and close behind him, frowned. “I did not realise we sent trade envoys to Jötunheimr.”

“You don’t.” He continued to guide them deeper, his own voice the rumble of low unseen avalanche. “I am meaning, before the war.”

“Oh?”

“Of course, I was very young then. I recall little.” And before Loki could think to ask, “He does not speak of it often.” Helblindi’s eyes remained forward facing, his step surprisingly light upon the smooth surface of the ground beneath bare feet. “My lord sire, I mean.”

And why his tongue would tie itself in such knots now, Loki did not know. “I see,” was all he managed. The frost giant’s face, high above his natural sightline and shadowed by the low illumination of even so great a hall, might have smiled. Loki could not tell.

“You will,” Helblindi replied, and then said no more as they drew closer still to the king’s great hall. And there, Loki saw him at last, high upon his simple throne, gazing down upon all with clever crimson eyes and an expression that might have seemed weary, perhaps bored – unless one knew the value of such a mask, when in the same position as the fallen king of Jötunheimr.

Laufey, when he stood, seemed somehow impossibly bigger than even his own hulking son. But as he descended the steps to the dais below, a different air settled about those broad armoured shoulders. Loki could sense something hectic, something dreadfully unsettled in Helblindi’s aura; this was someone who would need to prove himself, when he took the throne.

 Laufey-king was himself something stranger. While older, Loki would not have named him precisely _wise_ ; rather, there was a knowing air about him, a person who had experienced far more than he should have in even his long years. A certain sly cunning gave intelligence to his broad features, the bright eyes very piercing and curious as they now raked over Loki in his leathers and furs.

“I have long wished to meet you, Loki-prince.”

Even as the words curled low in his abdomen, resonant with childhood fears not quite forgotten, Loki moved graceful into low courtly bow. He was not precisely certain it would be considered appropriate, amongst the Jötnar. He suspected it did not matter. “The honour is mine, Laufey-king.”

What followed proved to be a strange sequence of days. They soon discovered there was no precise demarcation of night and day, just the odd perpetual twilight that lent everything that gloomy blue light – even their own pale Asgardian skins. Laufey proved a most gracious host all the same, providing a tour of the city, and then the estates and farmland that surrounding it in an ever-opening spiral. Loki found it somewhat humbling to realise he learned more in that time than in his hundreds of years of schooling. Laufey appeared to find his ignorance amusing, but not in a cruel way. In fact he appeared almost pleased to tell him of the ice-bound realm.

But for all that, Loki did not spend a great deal of time in the king’s presence – although somehow it still felt to be more than he would have assumed the Jötunn would have spared for him. The focus instead was more upon Helblindi, his mirror as presumed heir, with the occasional glimpse of a shy and retiring second son. Much as his existence intrigued Loki, himself an only child, Býleistr was kept away with vague statements of court protocol and preference of status.

It came all too quickly to its end, for all Loki had not even thought a week ago to have been in such a place. The last dinner would be taken alone, with the king. Without any of his guard to hand, either the Einherjar or one of the warriors, it would be a perfect opportunity for murder, perhaps. Sif had certainly thought so, warning darkly of assassination and what damage Loki’s death would do the royal house of Ásgarðr.

Laufey instead appeared more interested in talking Loki through the complex courses of a full banquet meal. As they moved past soups and winter salads, Loki wondered if the Jötunn king intended him an ignominious death by poison. Then Loki merely shrugged within his thoughts and continued the meal. He would deserve such an ending, if his skills at gastronomic detection had become so very rusty.

Towards the latter courses, Loki found his attention increasingly magnetised by the frost giant king himself. He’d had precious little chance to observe him earlier, and the lighting in the dining hall seemed brighter than its usual wont. At the king’s left, Loki could observe him in profile: a noble, well-formed face, somehow both alien and yet achingly familiar. But he’d known so little of Jötunheimr, before, and even less of its king. A strange desire moved in him then: how he wished to see it in Asgardian form.

And then those red eyes turned suddenly upon, that piercing gaze he so favoured seeming to stare right through him. In that moment Loki could not be sure than even he, the fable liesmith of Ásgarðr, could have spun untruths beneath such unflinching regard.

When he smiled, it was a strange and beautiful thing. “You are a suitable heir indeed.”

Loki’s eyes dropped back to his plate; the odd tremor of his fingers could not be masked even when he moved to dismember the small sea-creature presented upon his plate. “Well, I should like to think so.”

“You are not married.”

“Oh.” Very still now, Loki forced his voice to light conversational tone. “I had not realised this was the purpose of my trip.”

“Perhaps your father did not intend it this way.” Clear amusement burned on those cold features, even when he said with something edging close to warning, “But you can hardly blame me for pressing my suit.”

His fingers felt numb, even in the warmth of his kid gloves. Still he stumbled not once with the odd utensils, over-sized and awkward in the hands of an Asgardian prince. “Do you have daughters, Laufey-king?”

“No. But you have met my sons here in Útgarðr – Helblindi and Býleistr.” His chuckle rumbled about the empty hall, distant echo of a passing storm. “They are hardly…suitable matches, for you.”

The memory came quite unbidden: blue eyes, beneath the riot of golden hair. And then, the perfect flushed cock, standing to attention in his knowing strong grip.

Loki kept his eyes down, upon his food, and willed his flush away. “Perhaps not.”

But Laufey was not to be deterred, one hand now moving to the goblet at his side. “There are others, not directly of my house, but of high enough standing that we both would benefit from you taking one as your queen.”

Glancing up again, Loki wished himself for a drink – but the wine had proved stronger than he would have preferred, swimming in his head after but a few judicious sips. He’d stayed away from it after the first night. “There have been Jötunn queens upon Ásgarðr’s throne, of course,” he observed, and Laufey’s smile was a flat and knowing thing.

“Of course.” Half-draining the goblet, he set it aside, tilted his head towards the prince. “I understand your father sent you here only to strengthen the ties between our realms as they currently stand. But I should like to believe that you and I, we might…explore others, in time.”

His own smile was forced, but pleasant enough for all the lie of it. “Are you much acquainted with seiðr, Laufey-king?”

“In so much as all Jötnar are, yes.” Something close to anger rumbled in his voice now, an old and bitter thing. “It is very much a part of our being. It is born of Jötunheimr, and flows through us as does our very blood.”

Loki had but once seen the Casket, deep in the vaults beneath Glaðsheimr. The roiling, restless blue kaleidoscope of its power had called to even him, then. He’d crossed the floor with a somnambulist’s awareness, one hand outstretched, eyes very wide and full of nothing else; his fingers had all but brushed the iron-worked surface before one of the guards had pulled him roughly back. Odin had never permitted him near it again.

“So it is limited to…elemental seiðr?”

“Yes, and no.” The assessing look upon Laufey’s face was hardly kind – almost hungry. “There are witches, of course. The Járnvid is nearby. Such places…call to those of such skill.”

“Might I meet one?”

And he laughed, a low and pulsing thing that had Loki reflexing flinching away. “I rather fear your father would send an army to take my head should he hear I had loosed his heir into the Járnvid.” Even as Loki took a low and guarded breath, Laufey shook his head, and then finished his wine. “No, my prince, I cannot take you there, and I certainly could not introduce you to the creatures who frequent such places.”

“So I shan’t be taking one to bride, then?”

This laugh came startled, sharp. “A very practical mind, you have.”

“Well, perhaps.” Setting down his utensils, Loki turned his full attention upon the king. “But if I am to be married by arrangement, and to a bride from another realm, I might as well take one who…would engage my unique interests, shall we say.”

“Do you have another bride in mind, then?” Again, Laufey’s expression turned sly, as if he hand a mind to crack upon Loki’s mind and sift through the thoughts he might find within. “Have I intruded upon plans of your own?”

And he thought again, of a strong body pressed against his, of the heat of kisses in a long burning line down the arch of his back. Loki blinked once, and smiled without humour. “I have not previously contemplated marriage, no.”

Laufey’s head tilted. “Then you would be open to my opening channels towards such a match.”

“You have not discussed this with my father.”

His tongue, deep blue, passed thoughtful over his lips. “Your father and I…have a unique relationship, perhaps. We have not spoken with one another save through emissaries in some time.”

“You still hold enmity towards one another despite the treaty?”

Laufey’s eyes rolled even as he sat back in his great chair. “I cannot speak for your father. But those days are gone.” The Jötunn king had become very still now, a statue wrought of ice and rock as he stared now at Loki alone. “Did you realise we knew one another as children?”

A strange frisson cut through him like the passage of a hot blade through fresh-churned butter. Loki had not felt fear at any point during his stay in Jötunheimr. And yet this creeping sensation moved now along his spine, crawling inside his skull to gnaw at the very edges of his mind. But it was no physical fear. This was something different entirely.

And Loki had felt something similar, when he had kissed Thor for the first time: a change. A shift in paradigms.

_This is why Odin sent you here_.

“I had not realised that, no,” he said, very slow, very careful. And yet Laufey’s attention had returned to his meal, those great warrior’s hands so oddly graceful over the intricacies of his meal.

“It was different, then.”

Again, his own eyes fell back to the fish-like creature before him. Bland in taste and in shape, Loki had as yet touched very little of its strange flesh. “It usually is, for children.”

“I would like for our realms to be more to one another than what they are now.” At the suddenness of those words Loki looked up, unable to mask his surprise. And Laufey smiled again, that lazy stretch of lips over his strange bright teeth. “If you can achieve this, then I would ask you to consider it.”

“I must discuss it with my father.” The memory of Odin, silver head bent over the scratch of his quill in the great opened book before him, sent a strange chill through his blood now. “Though I certainly have not considered my own marriage beyond the usual possibilities, I cannot say that my father has not plans of his own, that he has yet to share with me.”

“It should be your choice.”

“I am heir to the throne of Ásgarðr.” Loki’s smile was a practised, bland thing, lovely enough on the surface if nowhere else. “I will marry where it suits.”

“ _No_.” And then the wide features turned downward in clear frown, Laufey seeming almost surprised at the words that had left his own mouth. “I…do excuse my vehemence, Prince Loki. It is customary, amongst the Jötnar, for marriage to be tendered only when it is acceptable – nay, _desired_ , by both parties.”

Even given the inherent oddity of such a conversation, and the verbal minefield that it laid before his uncertain feet, Loki could not mask his faint amusement. “So even should you select me a wife from amongst your kin, if she rejects my person, the proposal would become void?”

Laufey’s expression was as stone. “It is how it is done, amongst the Jötnar.”

“But I am not Jötunn.”

And now Laufey had resumed eating, and said no more. Loki found himself only staring at his own food. While it had not been appetising to begin with, his diplomatic instinct had allowed him to feign delight. That was all gone, now.

“I will certainly broach the subject with Odin-king.”

Laufey took another bite, smiled, and then swallowed with clear relish. “I will look forward to his answer, then.”

Loki could not be certain he himself could say the same.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hark! An entirely new chapter!
> 
> ...it's a birthday present for @schaudwen. Because, let's face it: this story exists for her, now. <3

“You seem well.”

Loki permitted himself a faint snort; his father’s expression remained serene even in the face of a chortling croak from Muninn, perched upon his shoulder. Huginn, keeping something of a distance, kept his silence with it.

But Loki looked only forward, words as light as ice upon seawater. “Anybody would think you had sent me to Jötunheimr in the hopes that I would not return,” he said, and felt rather than saw Odin roll his eye. They had known each other far too long and too well to take offense where none had been intended.

“Laufey-king was a good host?” Odin asked instead, and Loki gave a quick and easy nod.

“Very much so.” Somehow, he was surprised to realise that he meant the words entirely without qualification. “It is not a place I would care to spend much time, I will admit. But it was comfortable enough, and he was surprisingly intriguing to speak with.”

“You enjoyed his company.”

“I…” While he had always been quick with his words, in this they failed him. Again, he did not look to judge his father’s expression; instead he made sure his step did not falter as had his voice, and listened for a long moment to the click of Huginn’s claws along the garden’s balustrade. Only when their rhythm matched, did he speak. “In fact, I did. Yes.”

“Good.”

Odin Allfather had long been known as a creature of utter enigma; Loki himself had been called much the same, and yet even as the man’s son he still could not determine what, exactly, the king had meant by that. In the silence that followed, they walked still; the palace gardens lay before them in glittering mosaic, fresh and lovely in the dew of an early morning.

“He wishes me to marry a Jötunn.”

The sudden words stilled Odin’s movement. Loki himself paused, turned back with a reluctance he had not realised would plague him at such a moment. But Odin’s face held no true concern, and certainly not fear; rather, he appeared thoughtful as he nodded, slow and very nearly sensible. “I suspected he might suggest as much.”

And Loki’s eyebrows folded together, something odd twisting low in his abdomen; for all his lack of outright concern, he could see an odd distance in Odin’s one remaining eye. “Have you planned a marriage for me already?”

His lips twitched, though whether it had been to mask a smile or a frown, Loki would never know. “No. I have not.”

In turn he raised just one eyebrow of his own. “Should I be insulted?”

Lightly given though the words had been, Odin did frown this time; for the briefest of moments, there seemed a flash of something almost like shame across those grizzled features. And then he only shook his head, appearing very tired. “While I did consider other options as they came to me, I had always had the thought that it would be this way, in the end.”

That tightness in his stomach spiralled deeper, even as his voice stayed silver-sweet as always. “Was it part of the treaty?”

That single eye moved to Huginn, who looked back with bright, unblinking black. And then Odin looked to his son again, grey-white head shaking in a single strong movement. “It was never specifically stated in such a manner,” he said, very even. “But that it could become a possibility, when you were of age and able to make the decision for yourself? That it should be an option was certainly implied.”

The earlier tenseness had now begun to abate, replaced instead by a sudden and almost vicious curiosity. As a prince and a statesman of no small renown, Loki had naturally read over the document in question before embarking to Útgarðr. Having noted nothing of particular interest in it, he had not really considered it much beyond the basic tenements while in that frozen land. He wondered now if reading around the history of the thing would tell him anything different, would allow him to see around the pompous, ceremonial language of kings and to what the men themselves had truly meant by binding their lands and their very selves together in such a manner.

Odin moved first – of course Odin moved first. As the king, it could be nothing else but his prerogative. Falling into step at his father’s side, Loki still chose to be the one to break the silence.

“I take it, then, that should he make a suggestion then you would have me consider it?”

His single eye moved briefly over where Huginn remained, still and silent, and then looked forward again. “The Jötnar do not force marriage.”

“So Laufey-king told me.” And then, without the true intention of saying as much aloud: “I found it curious.”

Odin’s chuckle was a rough and ready thing; more the amusement of a wandering sage than an enthroned king. “Perhaps it is because they are longer-lived.” But the odd set of his shoulders, straight and somehow heavy beneath the leather and gold tooling of his surcoat, said something different, but which Loki could not read. “They would rather the two brought together by marriage should be pleased by the match.”

Looking to the path ahead, again, Loki frowned and did not quite understand why. “As I see it, you and Mother seem to have done well enough by arrangement.”

A smothered laugh startled Loki enough to turn and look to his father; it was the sound of a youthful man, not one as aged as all this. “Ah, but then it was not _entirely_ by arrangement.”

That came as little enough surprise; Loki had always known of the deep and true affection between his parents. The thought of Thor that followed upon such heels came sudden, and unexpected. Still, even in his youth Loki knew that passion such as that between them both could not be expected to last. Certainly it was not the basis of true marriage.

As they continued to measure out their path in slow step, it occurred to Loki that Odin had never once spoken of Thor to him. For his own part, Loki had both attempted discreetness and then to simply quash those few rumours even before they properly began. But Frigga was her own person. Which meant that she had apparently decided to keep the matter between themselves. Loki could not be sure if it bothered him – that she had deemed it unimportant enough as to be beneath Odin’s notice, or that it was shameful enough to be kept hidden.

For now, he walked with his father a ways more, speaking of Jötunheimr still. But his mind had already gone far afield, and would not be easily summoned back. In the end there was someone else he would rather walk with. But, for all the morning was beautiful and fresh, made for lovers and for love, a prince had his duties.

As did his king.

 

*****

 

Another two days passed before he could manufacture an excuse to see Thor. Even then, he knew it would prove as thin and flimsy as the gauziest silk upon the slim hard body of a court dancer. But then he considered Thor draped in much the same, his skin burnished bronze beneath white fabric and golden chain, and he could not keep himself away a moment longer.

To his credit, Thor managed to keep his composure even when Loki’s hands closed over his eyes, great body gone very still and silent. “My prince,” he said, into the darkness, “might I suggest you do not…sneak up on a warrior in such a fashion?”

And he only leaned closer, chin pressed to the skin between shoulder and jaw, and breathed the whisper against his ear. “Why ever should you say such a thing?” he murmured. “Do you not believe I could protect myself, even against so fierce a beast as you?”

One hand rose, lingered just over where Loki’s fingers still pressed light to the orbits of his eyes. And then it fell away, and as Thor turned in the circle of his arms Loki stepped lightly back, hands now pressed tight behind his back even as he quirked a careless grin.

“Thor,” he said, and the smile broadened before he could help it; never did the prince allow himself such giddy excitement, but when he tried to tamp it down he found somewhat to his horror that he could not. Thor only shook his head, golden hair a molten river about his shoulders in the early morning sunlight.

And when he leaned against the low wall of the western garden, Loki could not help the greedy way his eyes moved along the curve and swell of his muscular form. Thor only chuckled, without the slightest hint of self-consciousness; he even shifted a little, just enough of a flex to have Loki’s teeth catching one tingling lip.

“How was Jötunheimr?”

The question was diplomatic, entirely innocent; dragging his gaze upward, Loki found it much harder to match such conversational tone. “Fascinating.” Clearing his throat of the sudden dryness there, he added, just a little too quick: “There were thermal pools I rather enjoyed.” But his tone took on something heavier but a moment later, thick and cloying and sweet as rich honey. “But they would have been far more pleasant with company to share them with me, of course.”

Thor’s lips twitched, again, but his smile stayed almost entirely in the sparkle of his eyes. “Of course.”

And this time it was Loki’s turn to lean back with languid grace, arms crossed over his lightly armoured chest, long legs crossing in a way that had Thor’s eyes skipping downward. “There are some nearby, in the hills.” And he straightened, again, though he made sure his hips moved with easy inviting sway. “Ride with me, won’t you?”

Perhaps it was nothing but indiscreet, for the two of them to move together to first the stables, and then to the hills. Loki could not bring himself to care. Not when the caves lay before them, open and yet somehow closed, given that within their depths they would be nothing if not alone.

With the horses hobbled at a distance beyond the narrow mouth, they ventured inside with little more than a small pack hefted over one of Thor’s broad shoulders. In the earliest reaches they could barely speak above the rush of water that thundered through the earliest curves and dips of rock. Then, as they moved back, it began first to quiet, and then fade away entirely. But the water remained, still and warming, now. And above the heat of the water, the glimmer of glowworms began to appear like sleepy eyes from the darkness, their small luminescent bodies dangling from the ceiling on silken sticky string. But they lingered only a moment, amongst their starry skies; with one hand tight about a bare wrist, Loki encouraged Thor deeper, to one of the caves they did not favour. The little odd creatures shied away from both sound and light other than their own, and Loki wished to both see and hear Thor after their time apart.

The small cave opened soon enough into a greater cavern; Loki’s witch-light, silver and simple, danced with rippling softness over the faintly steaming water of the natural pool it moved to hover above. Already Loki began to strip himself bare, the cave itself warm enough that it did not matter. And yet when he turned to reach for the bag Thor had quietly set down, he found something almost shy in his movements. Even as Loki paused long enough to watch, he only seemed to further slow in his disrobing.

“Thor.” The long, blunt fingers kept about their slow work, unlacing the tunic. “ _Thor_.”

At this he looked up, blue eyes bright and startled even in the soft silver light. “Thor,” Loki repeated, and a sigh escaped before he could reel it back, the fingers of one hand pressed light to his temple. “Thor, if…if you do not wish to do this, then I will not ask it of you.”

He blinked, the only part of his very still form that apparently dared to move. “….what?”

Something like frustration boiled beneath his skin, as sudden and violent as his temper could so rarely be – but he pressed it back, tamped it down. “Thor. You are very reluctant. Even if you were not dragging your heels so very clearly, I would notice it.” But even though his irritation rang clear, if the paling skin of Thor’s face was any judge of such matter, he still blunted the words with as much care as he could. “I will not have a partner so disinclined. Say the word, and it is over.”

Stricken, now, Thor’s hands fell away from his laces. And then the golden head hung low. Regret turned Loki’s stomach like fresh nausea, sharp and dizzying.

Then he looked up, mouth set, eyes too bright. “I still want this.”

Only his quick reflexes kept him from barking out a flat laugh. “Then what is the issue?” he asked instead, only just keeping the edge from his words

At first, it seemed as though Thor might not even speak. And then he sighed, heavy and hurting, hands dangling at his sides. “There are rumours.”

“Of us?” he asked, too sharp. The golden head moved only in slow shake; it gleamed like a crown, for all he wore none, had never been born for such finery.

“Of your marriage,” he said, slow and reluctant, and Loki felt the barest beginnings of a headache beginning behind his eyes.

“ _Already_?” And the sadness in his eyes, when they met again, was as brutal as any slap across the face. Gritting his teeth, Loki tried on a brittle smile, found it fitted poorly. “Thor. It is nothing to do with you.”

This time it was Thor himself who looked to have been struck. But before Loki could think of a reply, could lower himself to anything like an apology, Thor only sighed, shaking his head one last time. His clothes fell from his body like rain, and he slipped into the water without once looking back. Loki stood silent, a frown upon otherwise still features. Some part of him wanted nothing more than to gather his clothing, to storm out to the high field where they’d turned their horses out to pasture for the afternoon, to ride hard across the fields and leave Thor alone in this darkness, forgotten and alone.

“Loki.” Even his deep voice sounded odd in these damp walls. “Please sit with me.”

And he ought to complain about the free use of his name, about the lack of title and the breach of etiquette. But he only stepped forward with a sigh, dropping into the water by his side. He had not meant to sit so close – but whatever existed between them, it seemed a form of gravitation, drawing them ever and always close together.

For long moments they spoke not at all; Loki had only just begun to surrender to the warmth of the water, leaning back against smooth stone when Thor spoke, his voice too loud in the silence.

“I met your mother.”

“Oh?” He glanced over, his own voice far better modulated to the strange space. “How?”

He hadn’t meant to sound short, exactly, but Thor almost winced. “In the gardens,” he said, very low. And now he began to fidget, long fingers uneasy just beneath the water’s surface; such disquiet looked ridiculous on his massive frame. “She…she was very kind to me.”

“She is kind to everybody.” Realising that he had, again, spoken in the kind of sharp-tongued way he usually reserved for flyting with those who had been foolish in their challenge of him, Loki tried again. “Well, save those who incur her wrath. But then those people do not usually live long.”

Thor did not reply, eyes having fallen now to the water; there they stared at his big hands, which by now had stilled utterly.

“Did she ask you to return to Þrúðvangr?”

At this he looked up, startled and verging on suspicious. “How did you know?”

“She…has spoken to me of you.” There was an odd look on Thor’s face then, somehow shuttered and unreadable for all he could be otherwise so open. “She believes our affair to be…ill-advised, I suppose. She does not think you belong here.”

At that he nodded, head dropping like some hound chastised by its master. “I cannot stay here. Not when my queen would have me elsewhere.”

“Did she actually _say_ that?”

And he actually smiled, for all it was half-hearted and more than a little crooked. “No,” he said, and seemed to struggle with the words. “She was…very kind.”

Loki’s own voice grew edgy, ragged with the faintest hints of hysteria. But he could not give in. Not here. Not before Thor. “So you have already said,” he said, very slow, too careful. And Thor only appeared weary where he looked up; his heart twisted. Loki had long wanted Thor to meet his mother, and to have her meet him. To know his beauty. To be as enchanted with him, as fascinated by him as Loki himself was.

_She should have loved you. She was meant to love you._

“Please,” he said, and again, he looked nothing but miserable, and so very small despite his great and hulking size. “I don’t want you to be angry with her.”

Loki pursed his lips. “Tell me what she said to you.”

For a long moment he thought that Thor would not. And then he shook his head, as if working loose some rattle of thought, reordering it to something like sense. “She…she knows that I am berserker.”

Loki snorted, even if he hadn’t quite meant to; he didn’t miss the flicker of hurt upon Thor’s face. “Everybody does, to one degree or another.”

He paused, then, just a little too long. But even as Loki opened his mouth, he raised a hand, let it fall back to the water. “She told me that it is stronger than I can hope to control.” His eyes blinked, rapid and sudden. “That perhaps my parents knew this, also.”

A creeping sensation moved over his skin, like ice over molten stone. “She thinks your parents purposefully fostered you out to the country?” He smiled, utterly without humour. “Thor, your parents are dead.”

“Are they?”

Those blue, blue eyes – they looked at him, both hopeful and helpless, and Loki found himself struck hard by the memory of Thor’s foster-father. Of Hogun. Of them both, far away from this place, calling Thor back to them. Tightening his lips, again, he carefully moved in that shadowy place between truth and lie.

“You can’t know that.”

Thor only looked away, voice steady and shoulders very tight.

“I am leaving.”

Loki closed his eyes. “You are returning to Þrúðvangr, then.”

“No.” When Loki looked to him, startled, he actually smiled; something of his usual good humour sparkled in his eyes, even as his mouth slowly moved back to a thoughtful line. “It is part of the training for my intake of Einherjar.” Here he paused, again, and spoke with clear reluctance. “But she counselled me to consider not returning.” Then, almost too quick: “I don’t want you to be angry with her.”

“So you’ve _said_.” His whole body felt to vibrate itself all too pieces, sudden terrible fury roiling beneath his skin. “She is _my_ mother, Thor. I can be angry with her if I want.”

One hand rose, as if he meant to reach out, to bridge what little distance remained between them. Then, just as careful, he let it down again. “She only worries for you.”

“She shouldn’t,” he snapped, even as he knew he could not mean that. “I am grown. I will be _king_.” And when he said the words, he wondered how they only sounded hollow, almost lonely. “I can look after myself.”

This time, Thor hesitated not. The great arms came around him, strong and utterly without judgement. At first he froze, and felt Thor’s pause. And then he turned, face pressed to shoulder, and gave in.

One hand moved, brushed slow over the curve of his skull, dampening the hair there even as the humidity had set it to light frizz. “I am sorry.”

With a sigh, Loki said nothing, and knew he should push him away. It would be only sensible to end this now. He raised his face instead, still pressed true against the firmness of a warrior hewn from only the best that the Nine had to offer.

“I want you to fuck me.”

Thor’s throat worked in odd swallow, but his eyes were gentle. “Of course.”

And Loki frowned, words sharpened. “But only if _you_ want it, too. Yes?”

The laughter that rumbled from him then was low, almost sheepish even as he shifted his hip; Loki felt all too well the familiar hard heat against one thigh. “How could I not?”

Rising from the water, he beckoned Thor forward. His stomach tightened, again, to see the briefest of reluctance. But when he rose, the water ran from him in sheets, and again the high proud jut of his cock said much for what Thor really wanted.

There, upon a towelling sheet spread open upon the smooth rock, Loki encouraged Thor down upon his back. Straddling him, his own face close to the heat of that thick heavy dick, Loki canted his hips back and said not a word; Thor was no fool, and would know what his prince asked of him, even as he himself leaned forward and licked a slow, languid line up the seam of his cock.

Thor choked, his great body moving in sudden spasm. With a grin curling his lips, Loki leaned down, again, moved the tip of his tongue in teasing swirl about the head. The hips jerked up, hot flesh sliding over Loki’s lips. And even as he chuckled, a low growl from behind was his only warning.

Hot, heavy hands closed over his hips. Loki could still taste the sharp mineral tang of the springwater, salty now with the beginnings of Thor’s spend, but even as he dipped down to take a greater taste Thor bent his head to proper task.

The rasp of his bear against the sensitive skin of his ass had him arching up in sudden welcome surprise, hips sliding down hard against the body beneath. Thor gave him no mercy, his tongue already moving to lay siege to the tight furl of muscle it found. With fingers clenched into the towelling, Loki stole a half breath, tried again to move trembling lips along the twitching shaft before him.

All Thor needed to do was shift his head, sharp teeth biting suddenly at the swell of heating flesh; Loki gasped, the cock slipping from his lips, eyes closed tight and a cry rumbling deep in the tight clench of his chest. His heart had begun a hammer-beat, electric and quick, and this time it was Thor who chuckled, low rumbling brontide.

With a drawing of breath, he pursed his lips; Loki shivered to feel the sudden pressure of thick saliva against the tremor of his hole. And then, again: lips, and tongue. And though good etiquette said that he should return such favour, that he should again close his lips about that delicious thick flesh just below him, Loki arched back, again, and lost himself in the simple potent pleasure of Thor’s mouth upon his ass.

It could not last. Nothing ever did. But it became better, with Thor’s damp mouth drawing back, to be replaced but a moment later with the thick press of his middle finger. It slid within too easy, too welcome, and Loki could not care for the obscenity of it all. Instead his back arched further, acute inward curve, his own cock slipping slickly over the hard muscle of Thor’s heaving chest. He pressed down, took his pleasure as the finger worked in sudden jittering rhythm. With the other hand steady upon his hip, Thor leaned forward again, tongue teasing at the rim even as his finger stretched it ever wider.

As the finger withdrew, Loki sagged forward, hair falling into his eyes. Through the blurred vision, again: that delicious weight. With one trembling hand closed loose about the base, he leaned forward, taking it so easily between his lips. Thor’s shudder, and then those hands moved to his ass, again: first pressing him wide, then drawing him close, tongue flattened and working.

With low chuckle, Thor now shifted his head; the drag of bearded stubble had Loki gasping, groaning, letting go the cock again. Thor appeared to care not, peppering kisses now over the soft supple skin of each cheek, lips hot and burning. With a mind hazy now with sensation, Loki sat upward. Thor followed the movement, broad hands gliding up and over his waist; the thumbs pressed along his spine, then came to rest upon his shoulders. Loki, in turn, shifted his hips in short simple thrust. As he fell to rhythm Thor’s tongue pointed in turn, moving deeper into him with every undulation. If he moved forward enough, could even brush the heads of their cocks together, damp hot pressure that travelled along his spine in white-hot sparking pleasure,

But it was not enough. It could never be enough. Not with those great hands pressed to his abdomen now, reminding him of how deep the cock before him might go. Rising, turning, he broke free and slipped back into the water like some nymph of the spring. With lips curved up and teasing he turned back, found Thor’s eyes dark and so close to black in the darkness, pupils blown wide. With hand outstretched, he inviting him in, bringing him down to him alone.

With knowing hands – and oh, how Loki did _know_ what he wanted! – he set Thor down upon one of those wide, natural ledges, those hewn by the hand of ancient waters. There, Loki rose up upon his own knees, bracketing hips with strong thighs. One hand fell upon broad shoulder – the other, closed about his cock. Guiding him in, Loki threw his head back, the warmth of the water so very like the sudden dampness upon his cheeks. Rising, falling: he chased his pleasure down even as he gave it so willingly to the warrior beneath him, and the distant sound of running water seemed so like the endless trickle away of time itself.

When he looked again to Thor, Loki could not resist moving forward. He tasted of salt, of rich mineral water. Thor murmured something in turn, though it was only lost to the motion of lips; it might have been his name, or some faint, hopeless declaration of affection that could never been spoken outside of walls such as these. For his own part, Loki said nothing. But still he drank deep, down here in the dark, and knew for now nothing of regret.

 

*****

 

“Mother.”

So rare it was to speak to her in such a voice, flint-raw and sparking; her hands, quick and clever, slowed over the shuttle, falling back from her loom. For a moment he thought she would not turn from the tapestry she wove upon its bright heddles, but Frigga Allmother had never been a coward.

And she turned to him, her lovely face drawn in her sorrow, the faintest hint of shame flickering beneath. Yet she had been a queen for so long, perhaps even before she had ascended Ásgarðr’s golden throne. And so her chin remained high, her hands folded lightly in her lap when she spoke.

“You have spoken to Thor.”

He loved her. He always had; he always would. Perhaps that made his anger all the bitterer, to know she loved him in turn and yet would take this from him. “How dare you,” he whispered, for despite the fury of it all, she remained his mother, and he had never felt so small before her. “You said you wouldn’t interfere!”

She sighed as his voice rose, and her exhaustion settled over her like a draugr’s shroud; he suddenly wished for nothing more than to go to his knees, to crawl to her and place his head in her lap and weep as he had not since early childhood. “Loki,” she said, and the tiredness only grew with each passing word. “Remember, please, that I am your queen – as well as your mother.”

Even with his lips pressed tight together, still they trembled. And even as he yearned yet to go to her, he stood away. With a sigh she shook her head, reached out; with her shuttle in hand, she turned it over: once, twice, three times. The lovely inset, gleaming iridescent shell taken from the distant wild seas of lovely Vanaheimr, seemed to reflect from her eyes, turning the clear blue to brilliant split spectrum.

“It isn’t fair,” she said, at last, and set the shuttle down. “I understand this.”

With her eyes upon him, soft and yet sharp in a way they spoke deep of her unbreakable will, Loki closed his own but briefly. “Are his parents still alive?” he whispered.

“Yes.”

Opening them again, he felt and heard both the scrape of the words along his burning throat. “Why was he permitted to come to Glaðsheimr at all?”

Again she sighed, this time smoothing out the soft lines of her skirt over her lap. “As far as I can ascertain, he was not. Lord Gagnráðr tells me he came of his own accord.”

His voice turned sharp, pointed. “Then why did he not summon him home?”

“He is the father of boys, I suppose,” she said, and did not mask the hint of irony that played even beneath her sorrow. “Perhaps he hoped Thor would be put off by the city, by the constraints of the Einherjar.” This time her eyes shifted sideways, skipping across the wide airy room to one of the great windows. Even at this distance, its great open frame allowed her to see far across the gardens, and to the glittering city beyond. “In some ways,” she whispered, “I believe he was correct.”

Even though but the slightest distance separated them now, it seemed as though she had moved very far away from him. But the half-step he took forward came faltering, aborted itself but halfway through the motion.

“But then I happened. And he stayed.”

She looked back; again, her sadness seemed to run so much deeper than what might have been generated by an ill-fated romance of prince and warrior. “It’s not your fault, Loki.”

His hands sought one another out, laced together before his hips, and lay still. “No,” he said, very even. “It’s not.”

She took his meaning, though he had not thought she would miss it; no fool had she ever been. But she remained a queen, as well as his mother – just as she herself had said. “Loki, you must understand something: _Thor cannot stay here_. Even with his powers fettered by his ignorance of them, here he will learn them.”

He didn’t bother with surprise; there was little Frigga would not know about her kingdom. “Did you realise I was examining them?”

“Yes.” And there lurked an odd undercurrent of longing, there; Loki could hardly blame her, given her own mastery over seiðr, and the natural curiosity that would engender about that of others. Yet her words were as iron, binding burning chill. “But you cannot awaken them.”

That she would not trust him to know what was best stung, and deeply so. “Why would you think I would try?”

She actually chuckled, hollow and humourless though the sound was. “Because, as you well know, I am a seiðkona of age and experience.” Now she raised herself to her slippered feet, crossing what little space remained between them; her hands, when she took his between them, felt very cold. “He must return to the country. And you must encourage him to do so.” Then, they tightened, even her blunt nails digging deeply into his skin. “ _And you must not visit him there_.”

Her eyes seemed to fill the nine realms, pulling him deep, threatening to drown him in that blue deep. “Why not?” he rasped, and though her grip loosened, she did not let him go.

“Your place is here. In Glaðsheimr.”

He was the one to take his hands back, to turn away from her. But he could not put his back to her, standing only in profile, staring blindly across her weaving-room. So many hours he had spent here, as a child: warm and easy and _loved_.

Now, he knew the cold of what few shadows were ever permitted to gather here. “Do you know his parents?” he asked, sudden, turning back.

And she stood there, simple silhouette against the golden light of the great picture-window. “I do,” she replied, meeting his eyes with honest sorrow. And he pressed his lips together, again, and tasted something like a scream at the back of his throat.

“Do they know he is here?”

One hand rose, and he saw but the faintest tremor there as she tucked a fallen curl back behind one ear, her smile small and sad. “I know that his mother wishes him to return to where he was placed for his own safety, as a child.” And again her voice hardened, those of a warrior queen when she asked of him, “Who are we to deny her that?”

But Loki’s own were even, simple. “We are her queen. Her prince. Her king, to be.”

With a sigh she turned, again, though he would not call it surrender. As she glanced out over the gardens, again, she seemed only regretful, even as the seeds she had planted herself bloomed riotous beneath Ásgarðr’s blazing sun.

“Loki.” Her hand rested light upon his arm, familiar and fierce in its purpose. “I am sorry.”

The words were spoken from numb lips: well-practised, inevitable as the rise and fall of day and night. “I do realise the constraints of my station,” he said, flat and formal. “I am a prince. The only prince of Ásgarðr. And thus, I will do as I must.”

Her relief lay over him like the weight of worlds, and though he smiled as he bent to press lips to her forehead, the words unspoken tasted bitter upon even a still tongue. That night he slept alone, cold in even the risen heat of a summer that had already burned too hot to last.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SUPRISE! ANOTHER CHAPTER! ...I kind of accidentally wrote this one too, though I'd only been aiming specifically to get the previous one down for Schaudwen's birthday. Whoops. But I've now reached the end of what is written, though I have a pretty good idea of where this story is taking itself; if you're interested and want more, now's the time to tell me.
> 
> But in the meantime: Odin and Laufey continue to make MISCHIEF. In but one of the many ways they know how...

It was so rare for them to disagree; knowing that they still did, perhaps always would on this particular point, only made his heart ache. But he could never turn from her. And when she called to him, asking him to join her for a walk about her gardens, he went to her without second thought.

But as he stepped inside, golden gate pressed open just enough to let him slip through in the fashion he’d preferred as a small child, he wondered how it had been for Thor. Called by his queen, to her gardens – and then, asked to go back to his own home far away from her.

_This is my home_ , he whispered, in his mind, even as his heart ached to know it could never be Thor’s, too.

He found her on her knees, hands encased in light mesh gloves as she worked her roses to sweet submission; he went down there beside her, his chest tight and aching with the love he’d always felt too big to be contained there.

“Mother.”

Setting aside her shears, a simple pair wearied with age, she turned to him with a smile both faint and true. “I have some news, darling.”

He allowed himself no smile of his own, but still leaned into the gentle touch upon his knee. “News?”

“Your father wished to discuss this with you.” Her lips twisted in a wry, sudden grin; her eyes sparkled with a mischief more suited to a young girl, than a seasoned queen. “I told him he hadn’t the subtlety.”

A startled laugh escaped him before he could catch it back, and her own echoing chuckle made it even the harder to stop. Still, he settled himself, said in a tone far more suited to the heir and prince, “I see.”

Frigga’s own amusement began to fade, though she remained easy in her place before the nodding tea-roses. “Laufey-king has made a suggestion as to a potential bride for you.”

A brief spark shifted down his spine, but dissipated quick enough; instead he only frowned, shifting his legs to sit tailor-style before his mother. “So soon? He _had_ suggested it, when I sat at his court, but…” Unease prickled over his skin, like the sudden hoarfrost of a sharply-turned winter. “Am I then invited to return to Útgarðr so I might meet with said candidate?”

One hand rose, shifted over the silver-shot gold of her coiled hair. Her eyes never once left his own. “Laufey-king says she would like to come to Glaðsheimr.”

The first stirrings of direst uncertainty took him now, prince though he was; his mother had long been known as the lady of marriage. “You have accepted, already?”

She took no offense at the careful lightness of his question. Somehow, the faint pitying gleam of her eyes was worse by far. “Loki, my son,” she said, soft, and reached forward to gentle a curl behind one ear. “It is your choice.” And her palm lingered, against one cheek. “It is _your_ marriage.”

When she refolded her hands in her lap, the shimmering material there a fabric he recalled her weaving upon her own loom, Loki kept his silence for a long moment. His own hands were gloved, neat and sleek in their worked leather. And he closed his eyes, just a moment.

“Loki?”

Looking up, he made no attempt to falsify a smile, to fall back upon the courtly manners he had learned so young and so easy. “I…I just had not thought it would come so quick.”

And she shook her head, a mother’s soft reassurance. “You need not be married immediately. It is but a meeting.”

“I realise this.”

In the quiet that again followed, she sighed, stretched out her slippered feet. And her eyes wandered sideways, to the blue roses with the petals that would look almost silver under moonlight.

“Loki,” she said, and shifted just a little closer to him; her scent was the garden, and the sunlight and warmth that made it grow. “Surely you realised, that…what you have, now.” She paused, so careful, but he heard that she left unspoken: _against my wishes._ “It could only have ever been temporary, transient.”

“I _realise_ that.”

He hadn’t meant to sound so peevish, so childish; the sharpness of her tone, in turn, was not a warning he’d heard in years. “ _Loki_.”

And he signed, weak before her in a way he would never be before any other. “Mother…I’m sorry.” Raking his hand back through his hair, he shook it out, as if that might force his thoughts back into any kind of order. “I just…I’ve…become accustomed to his presence.” And then, too sudden: “When Sif and Volstagg return with his regiment, I will ask that he join my personal detail. When he is ready and fit for service.”

Frigga only looked down. She’d picked up the shears, again, and he wondered if she remembered doing so any more than he did. “You know that I cannot support you in this.”

“Mother—”

“If you worry for his future prospects,” she said, setting the shears aside, her voice utterly without tremor or lag, “I will ensure that he is kept hale and hearty in his father’s estate.”

His lips pursed to tight straight line. “Lord Gagnráðr is not his father.”

A sigh, and her face turned away; it was so unusual, to not see her clear gaze as she spoke. The turning of his stomach churned only all the more when she added, too soft, “Thor knows his place.”

He did not want to imagine Thor here, with his mother, in this place. “Why are you so determined to keep him there?” he asked instead, fingers fisting lightly in the short sweet lawn. “What has he ever done to deserve your scorn?”

She looked up, eyes very tired. “Loki, you know that I worry for you.”

“Well, I am your only son,” he said, and he did not mean it to sound so mocking, so hurtful.

But she knew him all too well. Those bright eyes turned searching, stayed sorrowful. “I would not have you hurt,” she said, so simple. And Loki forced his hands to relax, his heartbeat to slow, though succeeded really in neither one.

“You think that Thor would hurt me, simply because he is berserker?” Shaking his head, he resisted mightily the urge to push to his feet, to pace his fury out. “He’s not a mindless beast, Mother.”

“No. He is not.” Drawing her own legs up beneath her skirts, again, Frigga kept that regal presence Loki sometimes believed had been born to her. “But there is a great power in him, and it is without conduit, without control.”

“I help him find that control.”

“No. You could not.” Raising her hand she stopped his words dead; it was bare of all rings and ornamentation, and only all the more lovely for it. “He will be fulfilled there, Loki, at his father’s estate. There is work for him in that place, and he has the skill for it. He is well-liked amongst his peers, the elders, and the young children who will become his people as they themselves come of age. His brothers will return to Vanaheimr, in time, but Thor will stay.” And she closed her eyes, just briefly, on a soft inhalation. “It is his place.”

“You seem awfully invested in the life of a country lordling.”

She stiffened, and he frowned; almost immediately she relaxed, again, but her weariness seemed only to grow by the moment. “Loki.” Again, she reached out, this time laying one hand over his own. There she gentled the tight fist away. “He is…bright, and beautiful.”

Much as the petty part of him wanted to draw away, he could not turn from her. “Too beautiful for Glaðsheimr?” he asked instead, and did not mask the bitterness. Her smile remained a sad, soft thing.

“It is not the destiny of all to be called to the centre of all things.”

And she remained watchful, here in her gardens, as the air continued to cool with approaching dusk. Loki looked again to the roses, closing still for their evening rest, and swallowed hard.

“But doesn’t it interest you?”

“What?”

“His power.” Even as she sighed, sat back, he pressed ever onward. “It’s strongly elemental. Far greater than one would expect of any mere warrior, especially one born out in the country like that.” A faint line had appeared upon her brow, but he did not stop. “Yes, his family is Vanir, but he’s said himself they are not his blood.”

“Loki—”

“So where does it come from?” he demanded, as though she could possibly have those answers. “What made him like this? And why didn’t they _do_ anything to help him understand it?”

“ _Loki_.” Her eyes, so blue and so lovely, flashed with sudden fire. “You know as well as anyone the whims of fate are not so easily understood by those who are subject to them.”

“You are seiðkona – and great in that power,” he snapped back, unable to hold his temper now. “So why doesn’t his interest _you_?”

He had expected her to flash back; rare as actual arguments were between them, she had never shied away from any reasonable debate. But now, she paused – and again, looked to her hands, palm-open upon her lap. “It does,” she said, the soft admission given as she looked to the lines of those palms as though she might divine some future from their twist and turn. And he frowned, even as something deep within told him just to let it go.

“So why would you not wish to explore it? To keep him close, to know something of it?” Drawing a deep breath, he did not release it all the way before adding, “He is berserker, yes; he could be easily overtaken by the bloodlust of gods. But I believe it’s all connected to that wellspring of untapped power. It must go _somewhere_. And perhaps, if it had this conduit, it would be controllable—”

“Loki.” It was sharp, a deep and dividing stroke of an unseen blade. “ _Don’t_.”

“Why _not_?” he said, and for a moment his shout hung on the air between them. It fell only when she shook her head, the last fall of a guillotine blade.

“Because it is not your concern.”

“I will be his king,” he said, but already the insistence felt weak, pale beside her calm conviction. “Is it not my place, to ensure happiness for my subjects?”

“But is it his happiness you think of,” she asked, very soft, “or your own?”

The dawning night was not cold, and yet he felt as though frost had been forced beneath his skin, and into his veins. “Could it not be both?”

She reached forward, took both of his hands into her own. “I know you are drawn to him,” she said, her eyes so blue, so very much like Thor’s own. “But your lives are of a different weave. Can’t you accept that?”

“Is this what your loom tells you?” he asked, just bitter enough. And she paused just a moment too long. Pressing up with both hands, he stood, turned away. Before she could speak, he did himself.

“Is Laufey-king’s intended bride already invited?”

“No.” She did not stand, but then she had never needed to do so to wear the mantle of a queen. “Your father and I would not extend such without your own express consent.”

“Then invite her,” he said, and looked to the gate. He’d left it open, when he’d come in. “I take my leave, now.”

“Good night, my son.”

If only he could have simply left it at that. But he turned back, returned, bent to press a kiss against the dry warmth of her forehead. “Good night, Mother,” he whispered. And then – only then – could he walk away.

 

*****

 

It would be unseemly, for a king to write to a mere subject – even one marked to become a warrior amongst the king’s own guard. But there were other ways, other means, to find out something of what Thor was doing far from his side. Sif herself wrote to Loki often; as the commander in charge of the new recruits, it was merely one of her many duties, to keep her liege lord informed of progress. But her missives tended to be concise to the point of terseness, more list than actual conversational prose.

It was the letters of another that provided the information he actually sought. Volstagg’s written script, as voluminous and bombastic as the warrior himself, tended to cover pages upon pages of vellum. The content was much the same as Sif’s in terms of the basics, but: while there were those who insisted Loki and Fandral were the incurable gossips of the court, they had clearly never spent long in the company of Volstagg. Or perhaps they had, and he had simply drunk them into oblivion; Loki himself struggled to keep up with him, when in full form.

He had provided three letters since leaving with Sif and the unseasoned Einherjar under their joint command. There appeared to be nothing extraordinary happening amongst the ranks; to his relief, and the faintest of disappointment, Thor appeared to display no further berserker tendencies, his elemental power kept coiled in upon itself. But Volstagg and Thor had clearly only deepened their initial acquaintance. Volstagg’s letters spoke more than once not only of training sessions, but of long bantering conversations that went on late into their shared evening.

As Loki had noted before, they came from similar regions, and had crossed paths with many of the same people. A faint sense of jealousy dogged his heels with every word of every letter; Volstagg had apparently become privy to Thor’s entire life story, which Loki now only heard secondhand. But then, so much of their time together had been spent in the indulgence of the physical. And Thor hardly needed Loki to explain to him the history of the only prince of Ásgarðr.

Still, he felt the loss like a limb he’d never known himself to have, before now.

That day was a long one, acting as his father’s voice and judgement; more than one courtier had borne the sharpest edge of his tongue. The hearings dragged late into the afternoon, and when at last he could excuse himself he knew he should next return to his chambers, bathe, and prepare for the evening meal. And yet, in these days he felt odd discomfort when dining with his parents and their court. Frigga always moved with a faint halo of sadness about her drawn features; Odin remained always thoughtful, keeping his own counsel. Something in them all seemed to teeter upon the edge of change, and Loki had not even yet heard if the alleged bride had accepted the invitation tendered her by the Allfather himself.

His mother’s gardens felt strangely empty, without her immediate presence. And yet he’d always been able to feel her here, even when she lingered elsewhere. Long fingers curled soft over the petals of a night-blooming flower. It was not quite dark enough, yet, for it to open its face to purest starlight.

“You seem troubled, my prince.”

He didn’t quite bother hissing his breath out between his teeth; no doubt Fandral would take the sentiment from his words alone. “What marvellous insight you do have, Fandral,” he said, turning to watch his approach. “It is no small wonder all the ladies fawn over you so; you must be able to calm their minds and hearts with but a word.”

He came to a stop before him, permitted himself a mild preen. “Oh, no,” he said, his abashment quite ruined by his broad grin, “that’s just the beard. The ladies _do_ love the beard.” Raising a perfectly coiffed eyebrow, he added with a nonchalant shrug, “perhaps you should consider one yourself.”

“Perhaps you consider piercing your tongue; it might stop it flapping about so foolishly, if only for a day or two.”

His eyes took on gleam gleam. “Oh, I imagine the ladies would most assuredly enjoy _that_.”

“The silence?”

“Well, I wouldn’t have the room to talk, after all.” And still he smiled, even as he added with light ease, “But amusing as this joust of jesting is, Loki, I feel it is but a distraction.”

Loki arched an eyebrow of his own. “You expect me to confide my deepest, darkest secrets in you, Lord Fandral?”

“Even I, for all my skills, would not presume I could ever go so deep as all _that_.” And while the smile remained even now, his words had taken on odd earnestness. “But I am your friend.”

“Oh, are you?”

“I am.” Now he had become deadly serious, his focus something Loki had rarely seen outside of true battle. “And if there is something I might do for you, be assured, that I shall do it.”

“My gallant hero,” he said, dry as dust, and wished he had not meant it. Fandral only shrugged it away.

“Loki,” he said, “I know you miss him.”

And Loki met his eyes, even and calm. “He is but a warrior in my retinue.”

He might have laughed, that easy courtly chuckle, had matters not been so peculiar. Yet even Fandral had age and wisdom enough to know when to let it be. “Loki, I’ve seen you dally with warriors, just for the convenience and the cut of their cock.” His brow furrowed, lips pressed tight between moustache and beard. “This is something…rather different.”

“What does it matter, even if it is?” he said, the harshness like sudden sandstorm against bared skin. “A prince cannot take a country lordling to bride!”

Those lovely eyebrows shot up through his hairline. “You would _marry_ him?”

It was a mistake – but one that ought to be easily enough taken back, when one was known as the Silvertongue. “Laufey-king has suggested a match,” he said, though he already knew he’d failed; Fandral’s widened eyes had not calmed yet.

“For you?” he asked, then, without an answer, “Ah. I see.” Then, almost curious, now: “Would you not consider him as…something on the side? Surely Laufey-king would not put forward a lady who does not know how these matters might be considered.”

“The Jötnar marry only for love.” His smile felt as brittle as the narrowest, finest of ice-stalactites. “I imagine he would find it an insult, should I continue to…ply my trades elsewhere, shall we say, when married to this Jötunn he deems worthy of Ásgarðr.”

He leaned against one of the older trees, now, turned his face to the sky; it was still taut with clear concern. “Do you know much of her?”

“Not even her name.” When Fandral gave him another surprised look, Loki gave a short, sharp laugh. “Laufey-king had intimated he might suggest such a match, but he did not indicate it would be so soon.”

“Perhaps he had heard tell of Thor.” A sharp look, this time, but the one Fandral gave in return had become almost pitying. “You can be discreet as you like, Loki. But things do have their way of travelling.”

“From your lips to those of your nightly rotation of bedmates, perhaps?” In the silence that followed, Fandral only staring at him in even silence, Loki knew only the bitterness of regret.

“Fandral—”

“I may not have your trust nor your confidence,” he interrupted, flat and fearless, “but you might have my advice.”

His tongue, sometimes, did prove a little too quick even for him. “I did not mean it that way.”

“Oh, but you did. And I understand it.” And he raised one hand, waved it away, for all they both knew such things would always linger longer than this. “But I speak not of Thor, save as the remarkable warrior he is now, and surely will become.”

Loki looked across the garden, to where the blue roses would have again curled up for their slumber. “My mother would have him sent back to the country.”

“That is no place for one such as him.”

“No.” He looked to him, almost with surprise; and the gratitude tangled in his throat, hot and heavy. “No, it’s not.”

“Loki.” Fandral straightened, brushed off the delicate embroidery of the puffed sleeves. “Met this potential bride. Allow yourself to think of what shape your marriage might take.” He paused, then, but they’d both knew he’d come far enough forward to never turn back. “But do not use it simply to run from another.”

Loki raised one eyebrow again, so tired this time. “And _should_ I run?”

“Perhaps not yet.” He chuckled, again, for all it held little true humour. “I am hardly one to counsel against the taking of pleasure, especially when one finds it there so true. But…”

It felt to him as bleak as the tundras of distant Jötunheimr. “But such passions rarely last.”

“I tend to believe they are not meant to.” His hand rested light upon his shoulder, faint but true comfort. “No fire blazes forever, Loki. It all burns down to ember, eventually.”

“And then, to ash?”

The smile turned cocky, then, for all it stayed small. “Oh, but there’s no need to douse it out _just_ yet.”

“Thank you.” It came unexpected, a little uncertain – but he meant it, and Fandral’s brilliant smile alone would have been acknowledgement enough.

“As always, you are welcome.” This time, he gestured extravagantly to the gates. “Shall you come for a drink before dinner, then?”

Loki did not want to. All the same, he extended an elbow. “Shall you accompany me, then?”

Fandral linked them without missing a beat. “We do make the most attractive of pairings, naturally.”

And in that undeniable truth they stepped out, together.

              

*****

 

There then followed a passage of more days; one late afternoon found them in the tiltyards, Loki engaged in but a little mocking competition with Fandral. Though at his most dashing in his gold and blue armour, well-seated upon his mount, even the fact he was a more than capable swordsmaster didn’t mean he possessed any real talent with the joust. But then, perhaps it could not be helped, when so often his pole would wither and droop whenever he came into the range of a smirking prince.

Even as Loki came about for another round, a raven’s call caught his ear, had him turning sharply away from his cursing opponent. There, back at the fences separating spectator from contender, stood a less avian messenger.

Dismounting, Loki strode across the sawdust grounds; the messenger waited, bright in the red-gold livery of the Allfather. As he drew close, his head bowed in low respect. “The king would speak with you, my prince.”

Still removing the heavy gloves, Loki kept his frown to himself, said light, “Immediately?”

“He asks that you be in proper court attire.”

Dismissing him with one bare hand, he turned to the page who had come running to his own assistance, and only nodded. “Tell the king I shall be with him presently.”

It proved the end of his own participation; but while Fandral asked if he wished for company, Loki asked instead that he remain to continue presiding over the games in his steed. He himself did not go to the communal baths, but instead returned in partial armour to his own chambers. There, he stripped himself down, engaged in only brief ablutions; the page had not intimated any particular urgency, but Loki had never known his father as one of any particular patience.

Only when properly presented did he proceed his father’s study, its rounded nature so very like the insides of some great oak tree. The guards drew down in low bow as they opened the doors before him. He paid them no heed as he stepped inside – though once there, he stopped short.

His father rose from behind his great desk, stepping forward only two or three paces. There he extended one hand to the person seated before it, lean and long in the high-backed chairs so reserved for honoured guests. She rose like the winter sun beneath his father’s touch, let it fall away – and then, looked to Loki alone.

Scarcely with a breath to his name, Loki straightened his back, walked swiftly forward. There he paused, eyes upon her, waiting for his father’s words.

And she smiled first, one hand held out, her eyes bright wise mischief.

“I am Angrboða.”

Even those innocuous words left him struck to silence – they invoked with ease a memory of the great serac-fields of Jötunheimr. Sound had carried so much clearer, there, and yet had seemed trapped by the high pale walls that pressed in upon them from all sides save one. Her hand lay cool first in his own, and then against his lips as he swept a low bow.

When he straightened, took her in truly. She displayed no self-consciousness beneath his gaze. Such quibbling would always be unnecessary, perhaps, given that she proved attractive by any standard. Very tall for a woman, her pale skin lay almost translucent over the fine-boned structure beneath. Blue veins moved in pale pattern beneath her skin, but a mere shadow of the very very blue eyes. And her hair rippled free over shoulders and spine, as black and thick as his own.

And still she smiled: secretive, close-mouthed, utterly lovely. “I am not what you expected,” she said, without an inch of apology. And Loki could not keep back the words that spilled out.

“You wear a glamour.”

She shrugged; the light gauze of her gown floated over the smooth skin of her shoulders. “It is more comfortable.” Then, tilting her head, her smile took on a coy note. “Of course, should it become relevant, I would be pleased to show you my true form.”

“Loki.” Odin’s voice came to him as if from some great distance – that between their worlds, perhaps. “The Lady Angrboða has come to us as a guest of Laufey-king.”

He kept his eyes upon her instead. “I understand he believes we would find joy, in being wed to one another.”

Her laugh came light, throaty and soft, and not unlike the amusement of the Allfather’s own ravens. “But we know each other not at all.”

“That is something time might take care of.” Clearing his throat, Loki sought out his usual perfect etiquette, found some of it still remained. “Though he seems he wished our meeting to be complete surprise; I had not known you would come so soon, and I have not heard tales of you.”

Her smile turned to something almost impudent. “Oh, have you not?”

“They would have spoken of your great beauty, of that I have no doubt.” Here he paused, let his eyes take on a critical tilt, even as he reached out with a sense beyond the more usual five. “But there is something more to you.”

And her aura was as rich and fascinating as her appearance itself. With that dark hair, and those remarkable eyes, she held a presence not unlike patient glacial ice upon the most forbidding of mountain face. It was so very unlike the warmth of Thor, that brilliant welcome summer storm. And Loki thought of him, now, back in his home, back in his _place_ : of a busty blonde, long-haired and longer limbed, climbing to his loft. He might then lay her down upon his bed there, and in the late heady hours of an autumn afternoon, there he would take his harvest—

“Loki.”

A shiver shot across his skin, the immutable approach of cool winter. Shaking his head, he focused upon her again; she raised one fine eyebrow in return. “I must apologise. My mind…wandered.”

“Do I bore you so already?”

“There’s an air about you,” he said, almost clumsy, entirely unintended. “It tastes of ice, and snow.”

Her smile widened. “Well, I am Jötunn.”

“It is more than that.” And it was something just out of his reach; like some memory, hazy and strange as that of a child long grown to adulthood. “Silver, and blue—”

“Shall we all go into dinner, together?”

Odin’s words broke in, somehow almost crass, too rich and booming and very nearly vulgar. Loki looked away, found the breaking of their eye contact almost painful. The odd magnetism of her – it was so unlike the golden corona of Thor himself, but also so very s _trong_.

“Of course, Father,” he said, and looked again to where she waited. “We would not wish to be late, after all.”

When he extended his arm, she took it easily; through the thin glimmer of the gown’s fabric, he could feel the cool of the skin beneath; he did not think the mere temperate was what caused him to shiver. As they entered the faces of those already come to the great hall turned to watch, conversations trickling to silence. Angrboða kept her chin held high, every step regal and smooth. But not until he pulled out her chair, did he notice for the first time she was barefoot.

They exchanged only pleasantries over the meal; the court at large could be no place for intimacy of any kind. She was an only child, she told him, daughter of a lord at Laufey’s court; though she did not reside in Útgarðr, she came often to the city. “I am what they call a free spirit,” she said, taking a sip of very red wine; it matched too well the tint of her lips, flushed and plump. “Laufey-king has long tried to match a suitor to my hand, but I am…most particular.” She raised an eyebrow, held out her goblet for another fill. “Perhaps it is no surprise that he should think to look so far beyond our own borders, for one who might be more apt a partner.”

She did not speak much of how she chose to pass her time – “I find myself interested in many an occupation, and not only the one” – but Loki could _taste_ the seiðr of her. The longing to touch grew only by the moment. From his brief and recent time amongst the Jötnar, had found fascination in the patterns of their skin. At first he’d thought it a kind of scarification, likely begun when they reached full growth in both body and basic personality; it had been Helblindi who corrected the misassumption, stating they were lines of birth and house, born with the blood of their first coming.

Angrboða Iárnvidiadottir, with milk-pale skin, showed no such evidence of her heritage. And Loki felt only desire to run his fingers over her skin, to raise those lines, to know them, to _have_ them.

When she turned to him then, that sly smile had returned, as though she’d divined his thoughts. Her hand rose, the refilled goblet lightly held in the cradle of her fingers. “Will you share a cup of wine with me, Loki-prince?”

The place where her lips had been proved as cool and welcoming as her eyes. But after the dinner, an approach from Frigga and her ladies meant he scarcely had the time to offer her his regards for the evening. Her own nod to him was but the proper protocol of a royal wooing.

Retreating to his own chambers, he closed the door against what felt the Nine Realms entire – a strange thought, in his own palace, his own _home_. But her gaze seemed to follow him all the same. Loki did not know why it prickled over his skin, so; Laufey-king himself had said no marriage of a Jötunn would be forced.

_But I am not a Jötunn_.

And now, he thought of tracing lines with lips, with tongue, with _teeth_ – he not known before how that though might be so appealing.

His grand bed lay before him now – cold and empty both, for all Thor had never shared this space with him. But now, he wanted him. He _needed_ him, foolish as it was. To have Thor before him, laid out and ready, waiting for his touch and his word.

A sigh and a soft shimmer of magic, and his eyes closed. When he opened them, and looked down, so much had changed. His height remained much the same, but not his body; it had increased in mass, muscles now bulky and curved rather than long and lean. The pale cream of his skin had burnished to palest gold, and with the tilt of his head he felt it; the thick pale hair cascading over his shoulders, his chin and cheeks bristling with freshly-grown beard.

The faintest hint of laughter rumbled now in his broadened chest; when Fandral had suggested he become more hirsute, had surely not meant in this fashion. But Loki could not care. Not with this body beneath his hands now.

It was but the work of moments, to strip himself bare. Perhaps he had not created a truly perfect copy, but: he had studied Thor often enough, and even occasionally at leisure. For a moment, Loki stood in the cool breeze of the opened doors. The sounds of the city drifted up from their distant revels below; with his legs slightly parted, he palmed the thick cock already growing heavy in his hand.

Only when it had risen to full hardness did he move back to the bed. Laying himself down, even as he wore the guise of another, Loki spread out upon his back. Callused hands passed over chest and rippling abdomen; then they rubbed over the faint hair of thighs before shifting underneath. There fingertips teased over the tensed muscle of buttocks as he thrust his hips into the air, cock already straining and damply wet against his stomach.

The slick he got from his bedside. Broad blunt fingers were first coated, and then moved in almost perfunctory preparation before they were thrust up into himself. Rolling to one side, he split himself between the two: one hand before, one behind, three fingers plunged deep into his ass. As he worked them deeper, their twin clenched tight about the throb of his cock, Loki looked to the mirror, across the room. And there _he_ was: blond and oh so beautiful, flushed and ruined, and in the prince’s own bed.

His pleasure came too quick, tightening his balls, drawing up inside him like lightning poised to strike. Loki closed Thor’s eyes, and came so hard he choked upon the shout of it to the sky.

But when he opened his eyes, before the mirror – there he found only Loki, staring back at him.

His hand fell away from the softening cock; the squelch of fingers pulled from an aching hole had him wincing, scowling. He knew he ought to rise, to go to his bathchambers and wash away all evidence of this bitterest of pleasures. Instead he turned his back upon his own reflection, closed his eyes tight, and waited on sleep that took far longer in coming than he had.


End file.
